Giannola, Salvatore (1887-1919)

Born Terrasini, Sicily, June 2, 1887.
Killed Detroit, MI, Oct. 2, 1919.

Sam Giannola succeeded as boss of a Detroit-area Mafia following the assassination of his brother Tony. Sam Giannola's brief reign included a continuation of his brother's gang wars followed by an apparent effort to establish peace. Sam was murdered nine months after Tony.

During Tony's reign, Sam appeared to be the organization's most active racketeer and top enforcer. Sam was arrested in 1911 for stealing a quantity of olive oil and wine from the D&C steamship line, misrepresenting himself at the D&C warehouse as the legitimate owner of the commodities. Law enforcement found the stolen oil and wine at a Ford City grocery run by Sam and Tony. The D&C line refused to prosecute.

During the 1910s, Sam ensured that the Giannolas had a monopoly on produce in the Wyandotte area by terrorizing competitors. When a fruit merchant named Cohen was stubborn about remaining in business, he found that his horse was badly burned by acid. Cohen filed charges against Sam Giannola but then suddenly disappeared.

Harry Paul and Morris Harris were shot to death in 1916 after opening a competing store. Sam Giannola first agreed to buy out their business and put $200 down on a sale price of $7,000 but then failed to make required payments. The sellers confronted Giannola, insisting he pay the remaining $6,800. Soon after, Paul and Harris were found dead. Sam was arrested but soon released due to a lack of evidence against him.

Around the time of brother Tony's death in January 1919, the Giannolas appeared to be preparing to move out of the Detroit area. One report suggested they intended to open a macaroni factory in Cincinnati. But Sam remained too long after burying his brother.

In February, he was nearly killed in a shooting that took the life of his brother-in-law Pasquale Danni. Sam apparently figured that rival John Vitale was behind that shooting. At the time of Danni's funeral, a drive-by shooting but numerous holes in the front of a Vitale grocery in Wyandotte. Vitale was subsequently jailed for opening on police officers investigating the incident, believing them to be Giannola gunmen.

When Vitale visitors - Vito Renda, Salvatore Evola and Vitale's teenage son Joseph - showed up at county jail on February 26, they were met by two Giannola men. Renda was shot more than 20 times. Before he died, he told authorities that his killer was Sam Giannola. Evola and Joseph Vitale were wounded but recovered.

In the early afternoon of October 2, Sam Giannola visited a bank at Russell Street and Monroe Avenue to cash a $200 check. As he exited the building, gunmen opened fire on him. Giannola managed to get back inside the bank but then fell dead with more than two dozen bullet wounds in his body.

See also:

• Detroit Crime Bosses - Mafiahistory.us.

Sources:

• Salvatore Giannola Death Certificate, State of Michigan Department of State Division of Vital Statistics, reg. no. 9756, Oct. 2, 1919.
• "Arrested often fined twice, is Sam's record," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 3, 1919, p. 3.
• "Auto bandits kill two men," Lansing MI State Journal, Nov. 16, 1916, p. 1.
• "Fruit dealer arrested," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 15, 1911, p. 16.
• "Gunmen murder 'Tony' Giannola, fuedist leader," Detroit Free Press, Jan. 4, 1919, p. 1.
• "Men in disguise of women shoot down Italians," Port Huron MI Times-Herald, Nov. 16, 1916, p. 1.
• "Murdered men suspected as German spies," Detroit Free Press, Nov. 17, 1916, p. 1.
• "Trial of 4 for Peter Bosco murder begun," Detroit Free Press, Dec. 30, 1919, p. B1.
• "Sam Giannola, feudist, slain; shot 28 times," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 3, 1919, p. 1.
• "Victim of feud gasps name of Sam Giannola," Detroit Free Press, Feb. 27, 1919, p. 1
• "Vitale, Giannola foe, builds alibi in advance," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 3, 1919, p. 3.
• "Wyandotte murder suspect released," Lansing MI State Journal, Nov. 23, 1916, p. 13.
• Murray, Riley, "Sicilian gang guns blazed in city feud," Detroit Free Press, Aug. 27, 1950, p. E8.
• Rice, Dennis, "Salvatore Giannola," Find A Grave, findagrave.com, memorial no. 7814145, Sept. 1, 2003, accessed Nov. 24, 1018.

Giannola, Antonino (1878-1919)

Born Terrasini, Sicily, Nov. 15, 1878.
Killed Detroit, MI, Jan. 3, 1919.

Tony Giannola was an early Mafia boss in the Detroit area. He and his younger brother Salvatore "Sam" built a produce monopoly in Wyandotte, extorted payments from successful Italian businessmen in Wyandotte and Detroit and engaged in a series of gang wars that eventually claimed both of their lives.

First noted in Ford City in the early 1900s, Tony Giannola established a successful produce business there. He was later connected with grocery and macaroni businesses. He also built up a Mafia organization that included many of the later leaders of Detroit's underworld.

Around 1910, Giannola pushed into Detroit's East Side business district, conducting Black Hand extortion rackets in that area. Local businessmen embraced rival underworld leader Vito Adamo as their protector and organized a vigilante White Hand Society. Giannola and Adamo fought each other for years. The Giannola brothers were arrested after a September 1913 exchange of gunfire with rivals that seriously wounded a passerby. They were charged with minor offenses and released.

The Giannola Gang lost some of its more powerful members when Tony Giannola and his business partner Peter Bosco parted ways. Giannola apparently believed that Bosco was cheating him. When Bosco was murdered in October 1918, Bosco lieutenant John Vitale and Bosco's entire underworld faction broke with the Giannolas.

Bosco followers were believed to be behind the Jan. 3, 1919, murder of Tony Giannola. That evening, Giannola was visiting the family of a just-murdered friend. As he approached the house, a gunman emerged from a dark alley and shot him in the head and body. Police found the dead Mafia boss outside of 189 Rivard Street.

See also:

• Detroit Crime Bosses - Mafiahistory.us.

Sources:

• Tony Giannola Death Certificate, State of Michigan Department of State Division of Vital Statistics, reg. no. 205, Jan. 3, 1919.
• "Alleged assassins sued by innocent bystander," Detroit Free Press, May 14, 1915, p. 5.
• "Gunmen murder 'Tony' Giannola, fuedist leader," Detroit Free Press, Jan. 4, 1919, p. 1.
• "Murdered men suspected as German spies," Detroit Free Press, Nov. 17, 1916, p. 1.
• "Trial of 4 for Peter Bosco murder begun," Detroit Free Press, Dec. 30, 1919, p. B1.
• Rice, Dennis, "Antonio Giannola, Jr.," Find A Grave, findagrave.com, memorial no. 7814142, Sept. 1, 2003, accessed Nov. 24, 2018.
• Murray, Riley, "Sicilian gang guns blazed in city feud," Detroit Free Press, Aug. 27, 1950, p. E8.

Adamo, Vito (1883-1913)

Born Sicily, Aug. 18, 1883.
Killed Detroit, MI, Nov. 24, 1913.

Vito Adamo was an early Mafia leader in the Detroit business district. He and his younger brother Salvatore were killed during a war with the Giannola Gang.

The Adamo birthplace is not entirely certain, though some sources indicate it was Salemi, an inland Sicilian municipality in the western Province of Trapani. (Appropriate age Adamos named Vito and Salvatore and originating in Salemi can be found in the immigration records from the early 1900s, but those Adamos were heading to Boston rather than Detroit.) The Adamo brothers likely led a small Mafia organization in Detroit in the early 1900s, when local Italian businessmen sought their protection from Black Hand extortionists.

Vito Adamo became the champion of a "White Hand Society" formed to eradicate the Black Handers of the Giannola Gang, who were encroaching on the business district from downriver bases in Ford City and Wyandotte.

Black Hander Carlo Caleca was shot and seriously wounded in August 1913. He lived long enough to accuse Vito Adamo and Filippo Buccellato of being his assailants. He succumbed to sepsis on August 8. Adamo and Buccellato were tried for murder. They were acquitted in October 1913 after Caleca's wife and a boarder at their home testified that Caleca told them he did not recognize the men who shot him.

Early in November, Vito and Salvatore were arrested following the shooting of former city police detective Ferdinand Palma. Palma had been forced out of the police department in 1905 after being connected with a human trafficking ring. He became a banker and padrone (labor agent). The Adamos were released after convincing authorities that they had a friendly relationship with Palma. Some considered the shooting of Palma to be an attempt by the Giannola brothers to remove a helpful Adamo ally.

At about five o'clock in the afternoon of November 24, the Adamos finished up work as traveling peddlers of wine and liquor and left the business establishment of their partner Pietro Mirabile at Mullett (close to current Nicolet Place) and Rivard Streets. They walked along Mullett toward their home on Champlain Street (now East Lafayette).

A short distance up the street, two men drew sawed-off shotguns from their coats and fired into the brothers. The gunmen fled. When police arrived, the found the Adamos in the gutter in front of 170 Mullett Street. Vito Adamo died on the way to St. Mary's Hospital. Salvatore died at the hospital a half hour later. Both were buried November 27 at Mount Olivet Cemetery.


See also:

• Detroit gang feud claims Adamo brothers (Writers of Wrongs)
• Detroit Crime Bosses - Mafiahistory.us.

Sources:

• Carlo Calego Death Certificate, State of Michigan Department of State Division of Vital Statistics, no. 6327, Aug. 8, 1913.
• Michigan Death Records, Nov. 24, 1913, Ancestry.com.
• Salvatore Adamo Death Certificate, State of Michigan Department of State Division of Vital Statistics, no. 9030, Nov. 24, 1913.
• Vito Adamo Death Certificate, State of Michigan Department of State Division of Vital Statistics, no. 9029, Nov. 24, 1913.

• "Dying statement may convict two," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 10, 1913, p. 8.
• "Ten killed, six wounded; Black Hand record in Detroit in eleven months," Detroit Free Press, Nov. 25, 1913, p. 1.
• "Two exonerated in murder case," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 14, 1913, p. 5.
• "Two Italians, brothers, are fiend victims," Port Huron MI Times-Herald, Nov. 25, 1913, p. 6.
• "Two more marked for death in blood-feud of Detroit Sicilians," Detroit Free Press, Nov. 26, 1913, p. 1.
• "Two more slain in Detroit streets in bitter Italian feud," Lansing MI State Journal, Nov. 25, 1913, p. 14.
• "Two Sicilians slain in Italian colony of Detroit; feud result," Detroit Free Press, Nov. 25, 1913, p. 1.
• "Widow's oath is blamed for bomb deaths," Detroit Free Press, April 13, 1914, p. 1.
• Rice, Dennis, "Vito Adamo," Find A Grave, findagrave.com, Memorial no. 7319067, March 31, 2003, accessed Nov. 19, 2018.

Licata, Nicola "Nick" (1897-1974)

Born Camporeale, Sicily, Feb. 20, 1897.

Died Santa Monica, CA, Oct, 19, 1974.

Nick Licata is remembered as the boss who presided over the dramatic decline of the Los Angeles crime family.

Licata was born in Camporeale, in the Sicilian province of Palermo. He entered the U.S. through New York on Dec. 7, 1913, settling first in Detroit. He later married there. He and his wife Josephine had two children in Highland Park, Michigan. He resettled in southern California in 1929.

First a grocer and then the owner of a Burbank cafe, Licata earned notice in the underworld through the summer 1951 murders of Kansas City Mafiosi Tony Brancato and Tony Trombino. Brancato and Trombino were moving into some of the Los Angeles rackets, apparently as part of a westward push by the Kansas City crime family. In mid-August, police rounded up Jimmy and Warren Fratianno, Sam London, and Sam Lazes, while they searched for missing Fratianno associates Charles Battaglia and Angelo Polizzi. Fratianno was considered the prime suspect in the killings, but Licata provided him with an alibi.

Licata became a front man for boss Jack Dragna during the later years of Dragna's reign. He served under Frank DeSimone for a decade after Dragna's death. After DeSimone passed in August 1967, Licata took control of a deeply divided crime family. Longtime California racketeer Joseph Dippolito served as underboss.


Law enforcement authorities had learned a great deal about the L.A. family by that time, and Licata was constantly hounded by police and federal agents. He was unable to consolidate his power. A branch of the criminal organization appears to have come under the control of Jack Dragna's son shortly after Licata ascended to the boss position.

Though he had earlier convinced Kansas City mafiosi to stay out of California, boss Licata also had to deal with incursions by the Cleveland mob family.

In July 1969, Licata was called before a grand jury to answer questions about the Jan. 10, 1969, slaying of Julius Anthony Petro of Cleveland. Known for committing bank robberies and suspected of murder in Cleveland, Petro was found shot to death in a parked car at the Los Angeles International Airport. Licata refused to testify and was ordered to prison for contempt of court. The following May, U.S. District Court Judge Jesse Curtis released Licata on $2,500 bail while he appealed the contempt order. Judge Curtis said he expected Licata would never answer questions on the Petro case.

With his family and his territory in disarray, Licata retained the title of boss - though probably not the power - until his death in fall of 1974. Licata died Oct. 19, 1974, at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica.

A Requiem Mass was celebrated for Licata Oct. 23 at St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church in downtown Los Angeles. He was buried at Holy Cross Cemetery. About 150 people attended the services.

Related Links:

•  Crime boss listing - Mafiahistory.us

Lamare, Cesare (1884-1931)

Born Italy, Jan. 6, 1884.
Killed Detroit, MI, Feb. 7, 1931.

Cesare "Chester" Lamare led the Detroit Mafia for a brief period in 1930 at the start of the open fighting of the Castellammarese War. He became a casualty in that conflict early in 1931.

Lamare was born in Italy (while he was referred to in the press as a Sicilian, he may have been born on the southern Italian mainland) and traveled to the United States as early as 1897. Lamare was noted in the Detroit area around 1909. He involved himself in various rackets - protection, bootlegging, narcotics, smuggling, gambling - in the Italian colonies to the west and north of Detroit, including the community of Hamtramck.

Police arrested him often between 1915 and 1921. So often, in fact, that Lamare sought (and temporarily received) a restraining order against the metropolitan police force. At the time, he noted that his only convictions had been for speeding and for carrying a concealed weapon.

Known to be the proprietor of the Village Cafe (later Venice Cafe) in Hamtramck, Lamare was believed in the early Prohibition Era to control alcohol, narcotics and gambling in the area. He was suspected of the murder of Sol Conrad, which  involved the wounding of four bystanders, in 1923.

Evidence of his expanding influence in the Detroit area was his role as best man at the wedding of "Black Bill" Tocco to Rosalia Zerilli, sister of Joseph Zerilli. Both Tocco and Zerilli were important gangsters on the East Side of Detroit. It appears that Lamare was an ally of the East Side Mafia at this point.

Federal Prohibition agents shut down the Venice Cafe for alcohol violations in the summer of 1924 and sought to arrest Lamare. They were unable to bring him to trial until 1926, when he was convicted but let off with a fine and probation. In that period, Lamare went to work for the Ford Motor Company, and reportedly added some labor racketeering to his underworld resume. He controlled an automobile dealership and also organized produce sellers in the region.

In the late 1920s, Lamare separated from the East Side Detroit Mafia. He became an ally of Wyandotte beer baron Joe Tocco (reportedly no relation to "Black Bill") and a strong supporter of New York City based Giuseppe Masseria, who became U.S. Mafia boss of bosses in 1928. Masseria encouraged Lamare to expand his underworld interests into areas controlled by the Mafia of "Black Bill" Tocco, Joseph Zerilli and Angelo Meli and an affiliated group commanded by Castellammarese Mafioso Gaspar Milazzo.

Lamare attempted to assassinate the rival Detroit area Mafia bosses by calling a phony peace conference May 31, 1930, at a Detroit fish market, 2739 Vernor Highway. Of the invited leaders, only Milazzo and his companion Sam Parrino showed up for the meeting. They were shot to death by Lamare gunmen. Many believed that Masseria personally approved the murders. The incident was used to rally many Mafiosi to a growing anti-Masseria faction and helped to trigger the Castellammarese War of 1930-31.

Masseria supported a Lamare claim as the boss of the Mafia in the Detroit area. But there was little support for him in Detroit. By September of 1930, Lamare was in hiding - traveling to New York City and to Louisville, Kentucky. Newspapers reported that other local Mafiosi had passed a death sentence against him because of his previous treachery.

Lamare business partner and chief lieutenant Joe Marino was mortally wounded at his Dearborn, Michigan, home on September 27 (he succumbed to his wounds a couple of days later). Lamare ally Joe Tocco became bogged down in a gang war against Zerilli-supported Mafiosi in Wyandotte.

In February 1931, Lamare quietly returned to his fortified home on Detroit's Grandville Avenue. Rivals tracked him down and had him shot him to death in that home just after midnight on Feb. 7, 1931. The assassin was probably someone known and trusted by Lamare, as the gang boss appears to have allowed him into the house.

Police, summoned to the location by Lamare's wife, found the gang leader with a bullet holes in his head. They also found a small arsenal in the place, including six revolvers, a tear gas gun, two rifles, 4,000 rounds of ammunition and some hand grenades.

Joseph Zerilli and "Black Bill" Tocco  were held for questioning after the murder. They were quickly released when no evidence connected them to the killing.

Related Links:

•  Crime boss listing - Mafiahistory.us

Sources:

• Chester Lamare Death Certificate, Michigan Department of Health Division of Vital Statistics, State office no. 140778, register no. 1599, Feb. 7, 1931.
• Detroit, Michigan, marriages, Certificate no. 256195, license dated Sept. 19, 1923, ceremony performed Sept. 26, 1923.
• Detroit City Directory 1928, p. 1283, Ancestry.com. 
• United States Census of 1920, Michigan, Wayne County, Detroit, Ward 2, Enumeration District 68.
• United States Census of 1930, Michigan, Wayne County, Detroit, Ward 16, Precinct 33, Enumeration District 92-523.  

• "Alleged gangsters arrested in Detroit," Marshall MI Evening Chronicle, Feb. 10, 1931, p. 2. 
• "Arrest Detroit man following shooting," Battle Creek MI Enquirer, Sept. 7, 1923, p. 1.
• "Detroit gang leader killed in own kitchen," Lansing MI State Journal, Feb. 7, 1931, p. 1.
• "Feudist chief falls to foes; another slain," Detroit Free Press, Sept. 29, 1920, p. 1.
• "Gangs receive machine guns," Detroit Free Press, Sept. 18, 1930, p. 1. 
• "Hamtramck waits move by governor," Lansing MI State Journal, July 14, 1924, p. 5.
• "Is refused review," Battle Creek MI Enquirer, Oct. 18, 1927, p. 13.
• "LaMare, lord of West Side, assassinated," Escanaba MI Daily Press, Feb. 8, 1931, p. 1.
• "LaMare's slayer still at large," Escanaba MI Daily Press, Feb. 12, 1931, p. 2.
• "Marino dies; story doubted," Detroit Free Press, Sept. 30, 1930, p. 5.
• "Mob leader 'put on spot,' belief of investigators," Detroit Free Press, Feb. 8, 1931, p. 1.
• "Secures protection from illegal arrest," Detroit Free Press, Oct. 5, 1921, p. 3.

Hoffa, James R. (1913-1975)

Born Indiana, Feb. 14, 1913.

Declared dead 1982; believed killed July 30, 1975.

"Jimmy" Hoffa, famed leader of the Teamsters union, was not a member of the Mafia but did have a number of Mafia contacts. It is believed that his underworld associates ended his life in 1975. He was declared legally dead in 1982. The details of his death and the whereabouts of his remains are unknown.

Organized crime within organized labor was targeted by Senate attorney Robert Kennedy in the 1950s, before his brother John became President and named Robert to the attorney general's post. At that time, Dave Beck was head of Teamsters International, and Hoffa was moving into national prominence as leader of the Teamsters in the Detroit area. Beck, in league with the Chicago crime Family of Sam Giancana, proved, due to his blatant criminal activity, ill-equipped to deal with the federal pressure. Giancana's group and members of New York's Lucchese Family helped Hoffa take over the International presidency on September 1957.

With John Kennedy's Presidential victory in 1960, Hoffa was in hot water. Late that year, Robert Kennedy announced that Hoffa was the primary focus of his attack on corruption in labor unions. Hoffa channeled many millions of dollars of Teamster pension funds to underworld activities in Las Vegas and other Mafia-run land development operations. Those secret loans, involving kickbacks to underworld brokers, illustrated the intimate links between various Mafia organizations and the Teamsters.

Hoffa was personally linked to Johnny "Dio" Dioguardi of the Lucchese Family. The Teamster membership records showed further links. Numerous known mobsters, including Tony Provenzano of New Jersey, were listed on the Teamster rolls.

Hoffa managed to escape a number of charges, but was finally convicted of attempting to influence a jury in 1962 and then of improperly tampering with the union pension fund in 1964. Appeals kept him out of jail until 1967, when he began a 13-year sentence. Hoffa and Tony Provenzano found themselves incarcerated in the same prison for a time. The two men, initially friendly, had disagreements and became enemies while behind bars.

Hoffa was freed by order of President Richard Nixon at the end of 1971 on the temporary condition that Hoffa not participate in union leadership. Hoffa's hand-picked successor Frank Fitzsimmons was still in control of the Teamsters and appeared unwilling to step aside for his old mentor. Hoffa's former underworld allies reportedly felt more comfortable with Fitzsimmons at the helm. As Hoffa began to plot a return to the union presidency, his relationship with Fitzsimmons and his allies soured.

On July 30, 1975, Hoffa was reportedly waiting at the Machus Red Fox restaurant outside Detroit to meet with representatives of the underworld. Witnesses said they saw him in the parking lot and making at least two telephone calls from a pay phone outside a nearby hardware store. Hoffa disappeared after that. He was declared legally dead in 1982.

Related Links:

•  Hoffa disappearance article - Mafiahistory.us
•  FBI files

Bonventre, Vito (1875-1930)

Born Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, 1875.

Killed Brooklyn, NY, July 15, 1930.

Born in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, in 1875, this second cousin of Joseph Bonanno crossed the Atlantic with a number of other relatives in 1906. He became a successful bootlegger in Brooklyn and a powerful member of Nicola Schiro's crime family. He possibly served briefly as a successor to Schiro atop that organization.

For many years, the Bonanno-Bonventre-Magaddino clan in Castellammare battled their rivals, the Buccellato Family. In the 1910s and early 1920s, that bloody rivalry reached American shores. Vito Bonventre appears to have played a major role in the elimination of Buccellatos in the U.S., and he was briefly a suspect in the New Jersey murder of Magaddino enemy Camillo Caiozzo in 1921 (the Good Killers case.)

According to Bonanno, Bonventre became the second wealthiest member of Cola Schiro's Brooklyn Family in the late 1920s (with Schiro being the wealthiest).

As the organization of boss of bosses Joe Masseria moved to put down an uprising of Castellammarese Mafiosi in Brooklyn, Bonventre was targeted. He was murdered outside his home garage on July 15, 1930. His murder and that of Detroit Castellammarese leader Gaspar Milazzo a month earlier are often considered the opening salvo of the Castellammarese War.

Related Links:

•  Article: The Good Killers by Thomas Hunt and Michael A. Tona - Mafiahistory.us