Obviously in order to whack a boss you need an ok from the commission. At that time Castellano was at the head of the commission so he had a big say on the Galante murder. Since Galaante was heavily involved with drugs and also a loose cannon i would say castellano really wanted him gone. anybody else have any thoughts on this?

Phillip "Benny Squint" Lombardo (Genovese), Anthony "Tony Ducks" Corallo (Lucchese)and Carmine "Junior" Persico (Colombo) had to be consulted or involed too. I believe Carmine was in the can when Galante was whacked. Since Castellano was against drugs which one benefited the most. I would bet Castellano hated Galante. Would be nice to see some wiretap transcripts on this matter. I know Mr. Neil was involved so Castellano was too. Good post JCrusher.....

Good point about Neil I forgot that him and galante were rivals. In fact phil lucky, sonny red, and bruno went to the ravenite after the hit

damn I forget where/when but I remember reading something about the Commission and Galante, and reading that Persico was the only one who voted against him being taken out. Does this ring a bell with anyone? I swear I read that somewhere before...

I think Galante's daughter was pre-arrainged to be with Alphonse "Allie Boy" Persico. That is why Persico vetoed the hit. With Neil being heavily involved you can bet your bottom dollar castellano nodded his approval.

I maybe wrong about Aliie Boy, but I am pretty sure. Wheres Ivy and Pizza man when you need them.

ONTARIO613

Made Member
Registered: 06/16/11
Posts: 227

Loc: Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto



Nick Pileggi aludes to it in this article http://books.google.ca/books?id=bNECAAAA...ed=0CBoQ6AEwAA#
I`m wondering if anyone Knows anything about the supposed meeting of 20 or more mafia chieftains at Bamonte`s restaurant on or about the night Carmine Galante was hit to supposedly celebrate the accomplishment. Like names of who was there and the roles they may have played, how many families were in on it( ive heard the commission ok`d it). also who was not happy about the hit? stuff like that.


posted in June I copied it.

I have always been curious about the Galante hit and what was promised to the zips to betray him.

bigger cut in the drug trade. galante was keeping it all for himself so with him gone a lot more can go around

Galante was never an official boss, more an 'upstart capo'.

What about Rastelli? Was Sonny Red loyal to Phil Lucky or already using the Galante murder planning to seize power like in 'Donnie Brasco'

Ronnie what did you mean by posting Ontatio613 details? I often wondered where he went...

To be honest Nicky, I can not remmember why I posted it. I guess I remembered seeing it and hoped it would spark up someones's memory about the Galante hit. I will research this more.

Its been well documented that castellano was a vampire and that he killed many of his enemies by cutting there throats but he always covered it up. He also used that beak of his to poke peoples eyes out

^^^^
The fuck were you Dick-Nose? Id almost forgotten how much of a pirate One Eyed Pete Gotti looked like.



I think he meant to quote it but just ctrl+a'd and copy n pasted. So he got left with the details. As for Ontario, he either couldn't hack the argument he started with phatmatress, or he's in jail (he was appararently quite the petty crook ). Either way, gone.

FWIW, IMO Castellano's 'role' in Galante's murder would have consisted of nothing more than him saying "yeah, whatever." By that stage, there were more than enough people pissed off at Galante to have put the plan in motion.

When the heroin trade got bigger their was too much money and not enough control over where it ended up which is why i think that gambino created the deal and die rule as more of a deterrent to stop soldiers or capos that werent really in his innercircle making that kind of money and then getting ideas. Whilst on the otherhand he could control who was dealing because they would be more linked to him and hed know what money was being made out of it. The structure of the mafia basically helped him to keep everyone beneath him and also anyone that did rise up probably had to be in his good graces or working closely with his people.

Galante was a threat to this because he had become such a large scale drug trafficker, dealers from other families were coming to him for their product because he didnt have rules gambino did. He was almost like a sort of terrorist to their system.

Another reason would be Galante had no respect for anybody. When Lilo got out of prison, he blew up Frank Castiglia's tomb. He flaunted his authority and power against the administration of the Five Families, not to mention he challenged the position of his own boss, Rusty.

that's what I read too. Rastelli was always the boss and Galante was an usurper; a powerful capo who tried to take advantage of the fact Rusty was in the can. I think he actually "made" guys too though and even wanted to have his daughter made.

Galante did inducted people into the Family. Joe Massino and Anthony Spero for instance

I think Galante was the acting boss for the Bonanno while Rusty was inside. Lilo had the experience and seniority since he was underboss of the Bonanno when Joe was around. I think he was at Palermo with Lucky and Joe Bananas when they were reorganising the Sicilian mafia and setting up the cross Atlantic drug trade back in the 50s.

However, when Rusty realised Galante was trying to wrestle the Family away from him by building an army of zips, Galante simply had to go. The other Families were eager to give their supports since by this time they were already sick of Galante's antics and attempts to monopolise the drug trade.

Technically speaking, to be acting boss, Galante would have had to been recognized as such by the entire family, including the official boss - Rusty Rastelli. As Vitale later testified, Galante was a captain who was basically "acting" as if he were the boss.

If that is the case, why would the up and comers in the Bonanno like Massino, Spero and Joe Chilli accepted induction by Galante when there were other Bonanno heavys around like Stevie Beef.

I am not doubting Vitale's word, but I reckoned in some capacities, Rusty delegated some of his power to guys on the street like Galante. It was only when Galante became out of control that he was rubbed out.

That's a good way to put it.

It is established that Rusty Rastelli became the official boss of the Bonannos in 1973.
Wiretaps picked up members of the Montreal faction, discussing who to send down to New York to deliver the Montreal vote.
Galante was in jail at the time. And his rank within the Bonanno Family is a blur.
According to Bill Bonanno, Galante had been shelved by Joe Bonanno in 1963 after being convicted of drug trafficking. So he was more or less powerless at that stage.
However, it is possible that Galante rose to the rank of a capo sometime after Joe Bonanno´s retirement and being strong, tough and ambitious that he was, was made the acting boss of the Bonannos when Rusty was sent to jail in 1975.
There is also the possibility that Galante simply made himself the boss while the other capos were paralyzed out of fear for him.
We don´t know exactly why Galante was hit. My guess is that the hit was a culmination of a powerstruggle between him and Rastelli.

I agree to a certain degree on your speculations except on Bill Bonnano's assertion that Galante was shelved for drug dealing.

Galante was with Joe when they set up the trans-Atlantic drug route with the Sicilians in Palermo. Perhaps, they have a fall out or something, but it's a bit rich for Bill to say that considering his father had a major hand in establishing the heroin trade to America.

Well..this has never been proven.
According to both Bonannos, they were strictly against drugdealing. Galante had broken that rule.

In 1957, there was a conference in Palermo between the shot callers from the American LCN and Sicilian LCN. The two major topics on the table were:

(i) establishing a Sicilian Commission modelled after the one in the States
(ii) establshing a sophisticated heorin network from Europe to America

The fact that Joe Bonanno was an attendent in this meeting and that his Family became heavily involved in the drug business afterward suggested he was at least tolerating drug dealing, let alone endorsing it. No matter how much he denied this with his fantasy writing of himself and the mob by linking himself to the character of Vito Corleone from the Godfather in his "novel", personally I feel he had a major hand in setting up the network and flooding America with drugs.

I admit most of my knowledge comes from the web and we all know how "reliable" they can be.

Joe Bonanno was neck deep in drugs.

an informant once told that bonanno went to palermo for heroin. some books also claim that the bonanno's where the biggest heroin suppliers of NY for a time. jerry capeci also says it in one of the mobster bio's he said it isnt so that they couldnt deal drugs it was the rule not to get caught.

It was at the Hotel Des Palmes, Palermo in '57. The reputed summit that saw Bonanno, Galante and I think Gaspare DiGregorio meet with a bunch of Sicilian bosses, to supposedly map out the heroin trade routes and such that would more or less stay in place until the Pizza Connection cases.

The 'dont get caught' thing was never official, but one of those cases were if you were bringing in the money, higer ups looked the other way. Genovese was also heavily into junk. Maybe not Gambino himself, but his family was as well.

As Ivy said, Bonanno was neck deep in it. Men of Honour my ass. It's ludicrous to think that Bonanno would have been unaware of Galante's smack rackets. In his book, the complete ommission of established fact regarding Galante's activities in Montreal and Stateside is an astonishingly feeble attempt to distance himself.

In Honour Thy Father, Bill wonders why his father tolerated Galante, especially after his drug involvement became well known. Probably because Daddy Joe was balls deep in smack as well Billy!

hilarious!