Lion in the Basement Growing up in the Gallo Crime Family

by Frank DiMatteo

  Then Joey set a up a meeting with Joe Colombo, Colombo instead of coming himself to see Joey and Blast he sent Nicky Bianco and Rocco Miraglia with a $1000 gift. Joey threw it back at them and told them to tell Colombo he wanted $100.000 that was owed to him, and "Tell Joe that's non negotiable". When Nicky left, Joey said to Blast and Louie "The Syrian" that "Colombo didn't have the fucking balls to come see me himself", and "The last time Nicky Bianco sat on a deal we got fucked", referring to the 1962 peace deal with Profaci, that Profaci reneged on. Nicky came back the next week and said "It wasn't going to happen", Joey then said to Nicky "Go tell Joe to go fuck himself", after Nicky left, Joey said 'he was not going to answer to Colombo any longer' and "That if we have to go to war, lets go!", so Joey started calling in the crew. For the rest of the year, Joey was gearing up for war with Colombo, stocking away guns, getting some cash to hold them over, if they had to hit the "mattresses" again.

  We also were trying to figure out who was going to stick it out with us and who was going to run. A few guys that weren't regulars left fast, Joe, Sally Balsamos brother, and Anthony Peanuts and I didn't see Ralphie Goodness anymore, they were gone.

  We were told not to go to Columbus Circle for the Italian American Civil Right League rally in 1971, because Joey did not want to show any support to Colombo. Most know Joe Colombo got shot at the rally by a black gunman, who was then killed at the scene, and of course the Colombos blamed Joey Gallo.

  No one had to tell us, we knew Joey wasn't behind it, he hated Colombo and he did want him dead. He would go into a rage when Colombos name came up. He didn't like him way back from the first war in the 60's with Joe Profaci. He didn't think he should be a boss, he really didn't like him. It was only a matter of time that something was going to happen, but the hit was not from us.

  The word on the street was the Gallos did it, even the newspapers said the Gallos did it. We knew we didn't hit Joe but the heat was on us. We found out the truth later that it was set up by the Colombo "Captains" to get rid of Joe Colombo, and Joey Gallo would take the heat for it. Carlo Gambino wanted Colombo out of the way, and gave his blessing for Joe to be killed. Carlo hated all the publicity and everyone knew it, I guess Colombo just didn't give a fuck.

  There are three major reasons why it didn't come from us, number 1, sending a black guy to kill Joe would have been stupid and the Gallo brothers were not stupid. Number 2, my father would have known about the hit and he would have told me, maybe indirectly, but he would have told me. Number 3, we wouldn't have been walking around like assholes, Punchy, Roy-Roy or Louie.

  We would have been open targets for any Colombo to come after us, and that's stupid! If you were not in on the hit you would not have been told that it was going down, but you would have been told to get ready for something. Now, if we could speak to Greg Scarpa or Carmine Perscio you would hear the real story, how it went down, because that's where the hit on Colombo came from. Joey and Blast got pulled in for Joe Colombos shooting but they were released shortly after. Then Punchy and Chitoz were pulled in, then two more crew members, Tony B and Ricky were picked up and let go. The law did this for a couple of weeks, then stopped when no one knew anything.

  This is when my world would change. I stayed on the block a lot after Colombo got shot. I know a lot of shit was going on because a lot of guys were coming and going. We already started to gear up to go war. We were trying to find out what guys were going to be with us and who was full of shit. The most important thing was where the guns were coming from, because you need many guns. You're always throwing them away, when the law is on your tail. Most of all Joey was tracking what guys were loyal to the Colombos because in the last war we got caught short. Finding out which guys were dealing with us and were also dealing with Colombo, some guys were just neutral. Who to trust?, guys can flip easy, wannabe's are the first ones to open their mouths, start the trouble, then run and leave you there with your balls in your hand! Sitting back in Roy-Roy's club I could watch and listen and see all the bullshit, who really likes who, and who the guys think are full of shit.

  I learned a lot then but it didn't register, I was 16 going on 20, I didn't have an open mind. I only looked at things one way, "all for one and one for all".

  I would have done anything they would have asked me to do. Thank God, Roy Roy kept me out of everything. He would point to his eye, then smile, he said that 'the young guys are off limits' and 'that we should be safe'. Then he told me to go to Court Street and hang out with my friends, and if I call you, just come back.

  So I moved around a lot. I was still working on the newspaper routes for an income. Scores were far apart, we had to eat and drink.

  The good thing was scotch and water was only $2 and pizza was 25 cents, so there was plenty money for that.

  When I was back on President Street with Roy Roy, I would sit and watch everything. I didn't like a few guys. I thought they were real assholes. The main one was Sammy "The Syrian", what a jerk off, with a voice like Edward G Robinson, that real "gingerella" shit. He spoke to me like I was an ass hole, no respect for anyone. I told Roy and Ricky, they said "Don't mind him he's an asshole", and 'they didn't like him either'.

  Pete "The Greek" was a real ass hole, he thought he was Al Capone. Dad said 'he was a real asshole, that the next fight would be his first', and "the only reason he was around was to drive Joey", because Joey for unknown reason liked him.

  Then there was Louie "The Syrian", a great man, a gentlemen. He spoke soft, but smart, he was "Consiglia". If you needed help you'd go to him, and I did, a lot of times.

  There was Armondo "The Midget", always friendly and made you laugh, and made sure you ate. He had his way with the ladies too, he wouldn't go out with a midget. We always saw him with a 6 ft blond, (well she looked 6ft. next to him!) he used to put his head right in their box when he'd dance with them. We used to laugh our asses off and he did this with his Mom in the kitchen, watching him!

  When I got called back to the block to stay, I was sleeping at an apartment we had, at 16 President Street with Goomba and Prosciutto. We were there sometimes for days if we weren't in the club with Roy. After weeks, I started getting itchy and I wanted to get off the block. So one night I went to Blast's club and asked if it was OK to go out to get something to eat. Blast said OK, then Louie said no, but Bobby B "said it was safe if the kid goes".

  So I took Mooneys 1966 Caddy Covertable, that I just bought from him. I got in the car with Goombaiel, we drove to Van Brunt Street, made the right turn, then made a right on Union Street. All of a sudden a car pulls up next to us and fires 5,6, shots at us and takes off!

  I hit a johnny pump! Me and Goombaiel got out of the car and ran around the block to President Street yelling. The guys and the Law, thought they heard shots, so the Organized Crime Squad took off after them. Then Blast told me to 'hold the fort' and disappeared, leaving the block. About 5 minutes later a car came flying down the block, through the police barricade that was set up on the corner and fired some shots at the club. Whoever was left started to scatter, some to their cars to go after them, some went back into the club. A few minutes later the Organized Crime Squad and the boys came back, they didn't get anyone. So everyone was pissed off, even the Law! We made friends with some of the Law They've been here for months talking to us, and we would give them coffee or some thing to eat, so we were pretty friendly. Detective Charle Bartell told us he figured that was a planned move, waiting for someone to leave the block then try to kill them. Hoping the Law would leave the block so they could then drive by the club, to do bigger damage. They even threw a grenade, but it didn't go off! I guess we were lucky, me and Goombaiel were OK, we just had a few more Scotches.

  My father was never on the block, he was always in the streets looking for someone to shoot. He used to call in and ask for Blast, Louie or me and said "Its Mr Goldberg". My Mom didn't see him for weeks, we had safe houses to stay at in Brooklyn and in the city. He would leave massages for me to bring him some
money or a gun and leave it at different places. First I had to make sure no one was following me, the rule was I was not to be touched. I was too young, but you couldn't trust anybody. If they killed you what were you going to do? Complain?, no one was going to say "I did it", so you had to be careful, so I always carried a gun. When I was in the car driving I would stick it under the dashboard. I would go to have a couple of drinks at the local bar, then leave with a girl. It would look like I was just out partying, I would then take her with me to the place I had to go to drop off the money or gun.. Most of the time it was at some bar in Brooklyn or Manhattan, which was fine with me, a place to have another drink! and let me tell you we did a lot of drinking. We would put almost a bottle of Dewars away a night.

  Most of the time Ricky was laying up trying to find Apples Macintosh and Joe Yacovelli. Ricky had patients, he would sit someplace for days waiting for them, but he could never find them. They were either very smart or they had someone telling them who was out stalking them.

  Civil Right Leagues Logo

  Joe Colombo President of the Italian -American Civil Right League

  Carmine Perscio Master mind behind the Colombo killing

  Greg Scarpa Ploted with Persico's on the Hit

  CHAPTER 12

  The Court Terrace

  I get a call to go to a bar called the "Court Terrace" on Court Street and Atlantic Ave, it was one of Joey Gallo's bars run by this guy called Rocky Trimatano. They needed some help watching the place, so he asked me to stay there, "what a mistake". The first day I opened the bar and was waiting for the barmaid to come in. Three guys that I recognized came to the door, so I let them in. One of them wanted a drink, so being a nice guy that I am, I went behind the bar and made him a drink and gave it to him. When he was finished he said 'I owed him a drink' I said "why", he said that 'I went past the register with a hat on, when I got him the drink, and that it was an "old tradition" to buy the bar a drink if you did that', I said "fuck you, I'm not giving you a fucking thing and if you keep busting my balls I'm going to throw you out".

  The next thing you see is me throwing a left hook, and the guy hitting the jukebox as I'm trying to shove him out the door. I looked up and its Rocky coming in the door, he said to let him go, so I let him go. Rocky listened to the story and said "it's a true tradition", but Iwas right, the guy was an asshole for pulling that.

  That was the start of an 8 month "hell ride" at the Court Terrace. By the way, the guy I hit into the jukebox was named Philie Jukebox (funny) but we made friends.

  Within a couple of weeks I had some of my guys there, like Goomba, Marty, Blake, and Steve. We ran the place with no trouble, until one night some college football players came in.

  There were four of them, and they were big, about 3501bs, each. They got drunk and started to fuck with me. I was trying not make it get out of hand but "all hell broke loose" when Marty smashed a beer mug in the face of one them. There were six of us, the heaviest one of us was 1501bs. soaking wet! It was a battle, it went on forever! I was on the floor most of the time with my legs wrapped around this monster, just punching the shit out of him. My cousin Blake was on him too, sometimes we were hitting each other. Another good suit ruined!

  When it was all over, and the cops came, they took two of them out on stretchers, the others just crawled out. The cops said that these monster football players should be ashamed of themselves and wanted to know if we wanted to press charges, we said "no", and they all left. I had some broken knuckles, the guys had a couple of things broken and some black eyes but you should have seen those guys, they were fucked up!

  We had a lot of good nights there. The music was great and there were a lot of broads. One night we got real drunk and got into a little argument with some guy that was a drunken Norwegian sailor. He came from "Montero's Bar" down Atlantic Avenue. I wound up getting into a fight with him, that spilled over into the street. I hit him so many times I broke my hand, so I started to kick the shit out of him. What I got mad about is that I broke my new alligator shoes! The soles were hanging off and I had to limp back to the bar. That really sucked! I paid $200 for them at Layton's in the city.

  When I got back to the bar, I noticed that my white gold diamond ring was missing, so we locked the bar down. We had all the customers looking for it, I said 'nobody was leaving until we found the ring', some people wanted to leave, I said 'no', we thought maybe one of them found it, so I pulled a pistol and said "nobodies leaving!".

  I saw this fat girl, she must have been 300 lbs. on her hand and knees on the floor looking for it. She found it in a crack in the floor. She got up screaming that she found it, she was crying, so I went over to her and tried to hug her and thank her, I couldn't get my arms around her. She just wanted to go home, we never saw her again. The rest of the night went OK, till the next day I got a call to go down to President Street.

  When I got there I sat down with Louie "The Syrian", he said that 'they heard what happened at the bar and he didn't like the thing about the gun'. He said he didn't want me to get into trouble drinking and having a gun. He said if the cops came, that I would have been fucked and it was bad for business. I said I was sorry, he said OK, we kissed and I went on my way.

  A week later I was in the "Court Terrace" with two guys, both named Raymond, drinking, when someone came running into the bar to tell me my friend Marty was having a fight in a bar down the block on Court Street called "El Boleros". Me and the "two Rays" ran to the bar to find every one fighting. I found Marty, to see "who" we were fighting. I found out fast, after hitting a few guys and getting hit from a ton of guys.

  I hit the owner with a bar stool and broke his head open. Then I saw Marty get stabbed in the stomach! Then one of the Rays got stabbed I said, "let me find something to hit with", I found a pool stick and just started hitting everyone! I was trying to get out the door. Just as I got to the door, I got hit with something in the arm, that my arm went dead, then we all got out. I had to take Marty and Ray to the hospital, the other Ray got cut too, so we were all in the hospital.

  When the cock-sucking owner with his head in bandages came in, he identified us, with him was a beat cop named Officer Gannon. He looked at me and said "oh no", then arrested all of us for assault. Two of us spent two days in jail and the other two guys went to the hospital. We got the case down to pay restitution, I never paid it. After the owner found out I was "Ricky's son" from President Street, he wanted no money.

  While I was in the hospital, Blast, Louie, Punchy, Roy Roy, Bobby B, and Castro, went to the bar. They heard I was in a battle. To get them to leave the block and put their life on the line for me, made me feel like I was part of the crew, but maybe they went for Ricky, either way it felt good.

  A few weeks later we found out the owner I hit, got arrested. He was a big drug dealer and had a beef a few months ago and killed a guy in the bar, and buried him in the basement! It was all over the paper, someone ratted him out. Goomba looked at me, I looked at him, and I said "That's right, I fucked him up". Goomba said 'fuck you, you're just lucky', I said 'no fuck you he's lucky I didn't put him in the basement!' then we just laughed at each other.

  Weeks go by, we were playing pool in Ju-Ju's when a guy named Joe Castro, a Gallo crew member, came in and pulled me to the side and told me he heard about a good score. I asked what it's about, he said that a shipment of coke was coming off a ship at the piers and he needed three guys to spot when the divers were taking the dope out of the water, then he would take the shit. We would be on the promenade looking down. When we spotted them we would beep him, he would be near the dock and we would come down and give him a hand, I said OK. So I got Marty and Goomba a car and some guns and went there.

  It was the coldest night of the fucking winter, we stood there from 10:00pm till 5:00 in the morning!, We shut the car off so that nobody would see us there. We froze our asses off and we almost got frost bite. It was getting light out, so we left, as soon we left and got to the club, Castro called us and a
sked 'where the fuck we were', we said 'we just left', he said 'they just made the drop off', I said 'I think that they made us, and waited till we left'.

  We found out later through some conversation with some guys we knew from Third Avenue, they did make us, and they knew who we were and that we were lucky that they didn't kill us first. We were told to stay off the docks, that it was Colombo families turf, and it was a Colombo score. Well, all I got out of this score was a cold and almost got killed! I guess you win some and you lose some, when you play this game.

  Then I get my first big score that worked. Joe Castro needed some guys to do a diamond heist in the city, so I call Marty and Steven C and we go with Joey. Well we did the score, Castro and Marty went in first and bum rushed this Jew guy and hit him in the head with a pistol. Me and Steven came in after and cleaned out what we saw in diamonds. Marty and Castro tied up the guy and we took off. After Joe fenced the diamonds we got about five thousand each.

  I guess that was a fare share for the young guys, since we didn't pay our dues yet. As we were spending our money in the poolroom, some guys ran up to us and told us that they were talking about the diamond heist on tv. It was showing some Jew guy saying that the thieves didn't get the real good diamonds, they were hidden in a small draw. He was smiling, but his head was all bandaged up. So we just laughed about the guys fucked up head. At least we had some money. We went to the city to get some new clothes. We got a few pairs of alligator shoes, some knit sweaters and I got a couple of pairs of the same black pants that got ruined in the last fight.

  Me at the Court Terrace 1972 the day before my first Arrest