This may be a dumb question and if its already been talked about I apologize (couldn't find a thread on it in the search engine). How does a guy like C. Persico run a family from behind bars? I know he has street bosses and everything but arent all of his phone calls and visits monitored? How does he talk about illegal activity? Order murders? Set up rackets, etc? Thanks in advance!

Not every phone call is monitored. You can't keep track of hundreds or thousands of prisoners making phone calls. It's still a bit of risk, but basic cryptic conversations can be done over the phone. Otherwise, when people come to visit you, they can pass on messages. Lawyers are ideal for this since they give you a private setting and they're not allowed to record your conversation because of attorney-client privileges.

a lot of the time they have code names when they're talking in jail

Actually it might have been difficult in the past, but with today's technology it is quite easy for the federal government to keep track of hundreds of phone calls using various software that raises red flags when words like terror, kill, hurt, hit, etc are mentioned. Or alternatively have all those phone calls digitally recorded (or like when Google voice transcribes and emails your voicemails to you) and then have somebody go through them manually if they suspect something.

believe me, whether the phone calls are listened to in real time or not they are most certainly recorded. look at the lengths that the government will go to for data collection on private citizens...

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2012/08/22/opinion/100000001733041/the-program.html

Of course LE CAN monitor someone's phone calls from prison, but with the millions of prisoners in America, they're not going to do this for most people.

They usualy change phones for one use only when having illegal conversations,using secret hand written msg's with codes(usualy bible codes in Italy)and on visists they usualy dont speak about illegal stuff except if they are using codes again...

Has anyone else used bible messages except from Provenzano?

in italy certain clans use some sort of "secret language",which is different between the clans.altough criminals in general and members of organized groups in particular use coded talk to keep civilans and police out of their conversations, traditional oc groups have developed very unique ways to communicate. for example there was(is?) the Baccagghju of the ndrangheta.its a form of the calabrian dialect.The state attoney who investigated the la torre clan of the camorra,described the talks of the imprisoned boss and members of the clan as a secret mixture of slang and gestures and mimic,which was allmost impossible for law enforcement to decrypt.
also i read in a newspaper,that there was a case of mobsters sending messages to tv show from prison and the tv show broadcasted them in continuous text(like in the news).

Who was it who was using tv shows? If that actually happened that's very smart.

Unfortunately, they always manage to find a way to give orders from prisons, even from maximum-security prisons and since they are already there, there is no way to punish them. The only way is to execute them, but the law enforcement doesn't do that because, as far as I know, to sentence them to death it is necessary to bring them out of solitary confinement for trial for a certain period of time and they can use this period as a better possibility to give orders to their organization outside. I remember watching a documentary about a boss of the Mexican Mafia who wasn't prosecuted for this very reason even though his people outside were convicted.
I am not a supporter of the death penalty, but if we speak theoretically, that would be the only way to stop a mob boss from running the organization.
I remember about Mariano Agate, an Italian mafioso who stays in a 41 bis prison which is so strict that it's considered "torture" by some people outside Italy, and he managed to create an organization with ties to the Colombian cartels even from there.

Mafioso in Sicily were using the weekly football show "Quelli che il calcio" to relay messages via the ticker on the bottom of the screen to jailed bosses under 41-bis regime. Eventually anti-mafia caught on and the ticker was taken down for good.

When i was in the USMC we had a system "software" i guess that would automatically scan every call going on in the country of iraq.... if any of these "words" were said the computer " or software" would AUTOMATICALLY record the conversation... and our intell guys would review this conversation and we would act accordingly sending drones or sending raids or convoys to the location....however it wasnt just 1 word... it had to be several words that triggered the systems for instance if someone said "bomb" "Military" or something that sounded like a scare... we wouldnt just send drone attacks to someone who said bomb and nothing else.. the system we use is VERY VERY VERY advanced and pretty much infringes on the rights of Iraqi people... since Carmine is a American we cant infringe on his rights in he same way but im sure if we can monitor every phone conversatin that is going on in IRAQ Afghan etc etc...the government does something about these upper echelon wiseguys conversations..... just because the government has rules and reulations tha doesnt mean shit the government can do what they want when they want and there is nothing NOOONE AND I MEAN NOONE can do about it... Any person on these boards if the government wants you bad enough you will go....not to get off topic about cosa nostra but our government assasinated 3 saudi princes's becaue they were funding terrorist... you dont think they can do whatever the want to any of us?

^^^^Yep. I have worked for the federal government and am very familiar with some of these intelligence systems.