Out of all the mafia families that have been decimated by RICO and age & attrition, who do you think were the strongest in terms of influence in their respected geographic territories and why? Not based on the popularity of each mafia boss, but their true power and influence?

Defunct families include: Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Northeastern Pennsylvania, Rochester, St. Louis, Dallas, Denver, San Jose, San Francisco, Tampa, New Orleans, Los Angeles, Rockford or Des Moines?

I would prob say kansas just for the money they were making in the Las Vegas casinos , that was the mobs golden age and they were in the thick of it . As for the LA family I can't believe nobody has really took advantage of things to a full extent out there

New Orleans

I am not disagreeing with you at all, but I am playing the devil's advocate...Cleveland was knee deep in the casino skim as well plus Maishe Rockman had Bill & Jackie Presser (both from Cleveland) in his pocket. Bill Presser was regarded as one of the most powerful Teamster figures in history. Plus, Angelo Lonardo at that time was regarded as one of the most powerful mafia figures in the country. If I'm not mistaken, Milwaukee and Frankie Bal were part of the skim too.

There isn't a right or wrong answer which makes this fun to hear the points of view on each of these defunct families.

I don't know about the family as a whole but Russell Bufalino was one of the most powerful bosses not in New York or Chicago.

Russ was certainly one of the power players.

Tampa aswel , they had one of the most powerful bosses in the country in santo trafficante

Some of the families are still not totally defunct , Cleveland ( Russell papalardo ) Kansas ( John sciortino ) Pittsburgh and millwaukee still have small but active families

Before I can answer this question what decade are we talking about ??the 50s or the 80s
Because depending on the decade the strength of families such as Cleveland and new orleans or Pittsburgh in the 90s, depending on the time frame it varies wildly.

Marcello ran the New Orleans mob for over thirty years.He pretty much avoided any major jail time,generated tons of revenue,and had vast legitimate investments as well.He had a long standing policy of banning outside Mafiosi from even entering his area,and nobody dared to defy him.

As far as Pittsburgh goes,the Family is non-existent. There is still gambling,labor racketeering,some drugs,and other various activity,but we haven't had a Family or any made guys for years. An old made guy (Ciancutti) is about all that's left,and although he still has power and is getting kicked up to,when he is gone the last of the old LaRocca/Genovese era will go with him.

not really sure theres evidence saying theres still an "active family" in Milwaukee, aside from the bogus charts that have been going around over the years. its been about 30 years since the last significant mob case, we've seen more recent activity outta places like new orleans(even though theres nothing left there now), i guess my point is if they were still sizable mob activity in Milwaukee something about it would've come out.

Marcello and Trafficante without a doubt, they were nationally respected and attended the "little Appalachian: meeting held in Queens in 1966.

Plus, they wacked a President

allegedly

No, they are defunct. A few made guys left, but no structure of a family at all. Please stick to topic, appreciate it.

Let's gauge each defunct family in its history, from 1950-Present. Overall strength, reach and influence...not on popularity.

Marcello and Trafficante were certainly powerful and influential individuals but their families were not as strong as, say, the Bufalinos.

There is no proof they whacked a President and if you have truly studied all the evidence in the JFK case, that theory is very far fetched.

The topic is which one of the defunct families that I listed was most powerful and influential over their history.

If you're referring to the Tampa, New Orleans and Bufalino's, they were very comparable in terms of size and respected leaders.

JCB1977 - Check your PM

Probably Kansas City because of the money that flowed into that city's family. They were the secondary recipients of the skim. Cleveland I feel lagged behind KC.

Tampa and New Orleans were relatively small. However, they had leaders who were very powerful, not in terms of family size, but political connections and connections to major leaders in NYC and Chicago. Yet, their power only extended so far due to connections with NYC and Chicago. I suppose the same is true for KC.

The Los Angeles Family was never very powerful. I also don't think their potential was quite big. The major rackets (movies, unions and adult entertainment) in California were dominated by Chicago and New York. The LA Family was more blue collar such as loansharking and bookmaking (of course this occurred in every city, but there were few white collar rackets).

Buffalo due to Bonnano family connections.

Trafficante 2nd.

Marcello 3rd

New Orleans had 90% of the south.
Cleveland had rackets all the way to West Virginia

I believe that Pittsburgh controlled West Virginia. However if you're saying to and not including: We agree.

In regards to the skim, Cleveland was actually with Kansas City. They actually received a higher percentage of the skim due to Maishe Rockman's relationship with Bill Presser, Allan Dorfman and Gus Alex out of Chicago. Rockman was instrumental in getting the Teamster Loan through Presser and Dorfman.

Here's a scenario I always wondered about: Let's take Traficante and Marcello, both prominent figures in their time and both had ties to New York. The fact of the matter is that if NY or Chicago wanted to muscle in to their rackets, they easily could have based on the fact that they had more muscle and clout than Tampa and New Orleans.

In Los Angeles, while they were one of the weaker families, they also controlled the motion picture unions through Anthony Milano, former boss and consigliere in Cleveland who sent both of his sons Carmen & Peter out to L.A. to run the rackets with Frattiano playing a key role.

In regards to the LaRocca Crime Family, their power was far reaching (especially from the 1950's to the late 1990's). They controlled not only the greater Pittsburgh area, but they had all of Western Pennsylvania going to Altoona/Johnstown, parts of Harrisburg, Erie, PA, Jamestown, NY, the entire panhandle of West Virginia and Northeast Ohio in greater Youngstown and the Canton, OH area. After a long war with the Cleveland Crime Family from 1977-1983, Pittsburgh moved into Cleveland territory when the upper echelon in Cleveland went to prison for the Danny Greene murder. Also, remember that it was John LaRocca who made the Valenti brothers and gave them his support to start their own small family in Rochester (in conjunction with Buffalo) as well as Salvatore & Angelo Marino who were made in Pittsburgh and sent out to San Jose to seize control of the west coast operation. LaRocca got a piece of everything in San Jose, Rochester, West Virginia, Northeast Ohio, all of Western Pennsylvania...That's five states of illegal rackets. Obviously, my expertise is in the Youngstown/Pittsburgh/Cleveland area and I'm not saying that Pittsburgh was the strongest, I'm just stating the facts of how far their tentacles reached while under Big John LaRocca and to a degree, his successor, Michael Genovese. Also keep in mind that Gabriel "Kelly" Mannarino, one of the nation's top underworld figures for decades and the LaRocca Family's most active member was partners with Traficante, Marcello and Bufalino in the Sans Souci Hotel & Casino, the Capri Casino and the Nacional Casino in Havana. Mannarino was also tied to the theory of the Kennedy Assassination.

http://triblive.com/mobile/4488473-96/castro-mannarino-cuba


Granted, Marcello, Trafficante, Civella and Bufalino were more well known because of their relationships with prominent New York bosses and Chicago, but Big John LaRocca had long standing ties to Paul Castellano, Tony Accardo, Angelo Bruno, Russell Bufalino and Carlo Gambino. In fact, Castellano was Big John's next door neighbor in Pompano Beach, FL and they spent a lot of time together in the winters.

ya it seems new york stayed out of their territories out of respect for trafficante and marcello, not because of hw much muscle they had,cause it didn't take to long for new york to move in and take advantage in new orleans and florida after their deaths.

I agree that Buffalo was one of the historical power players because of Maggadino's relationship to Joe Bonanno...but that quickly went south in a hurry right after Apalachin.

Very true...Marcello and Costello were tight. Traficante had Tampa, but the rest of Florida was wide open territory and there were plenty of NY and Chicago crews operating down there along with some of the other crime families like Philly. Not taking away anything from Traficante, but he didn't even control the state of Florida, but a relatively smaller area in Tampa.

Cleveland had a piece of Trumbull County, OH near Warren which Pittsburgh quickly seized control. Cleveland in the grand scheme of things had all of Cleveland, Akron and parts of Sandusky. Their control of Youngstown was very minor from 1970 on due to the growth and power of Pittsburgh at that point. However, their main source of income for quite some time was the skim in Vegas because of Lonardo and Rockman.