Lion in the Basement Growing up in the Gallo Crime Family

by Frank DiMatteo

  The assholes went to "Toddo Marinos" and made a beef about me. I get called to the bar, my father and Aniello Dellacroce was there. Aniello asked me what happened. I told him, he then asked if "I said I didn't give a fuck, that they were with him," I said "I did but not that way," he laughed and said "That never to say things like that, because when your right, it can make you wrong." Then one of the guys with Aniello smacked the guy in the face and said Never to use Aniellos name and 'get out of the neighborhood,' it was over; so was the club, it was too hot to keep it open.

  I ran into those guys from 'the beef' two years later in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. at the "4 O'Clock Club.' I was with Louie and Goombaiel. I saw them as soon as I walked in. I said to the guys "We're fucked, and to let me handle it." They saw me and walked over, I put my "fuck you" look on, hoping that would work. I didn't need to because they came over with their hands out, and said they wanted no problems, and to have a drink with them. I said, "If you are going to do it do it now!" They said, 'no, it's over.' I sat and had a drink with them, trying to make light of the past, but I didn't trust them. The guys were talking to a few girls, so I made my way over to them. We got out ok that night, but if I was a betting man, I would have bet we were fucked. On the way out, they came over and said to 'come again,' I said 'yeah'. Hundreds of miles away from home I walked into a place where all these guys were working as managers, "it's a small world."

  At the end of 1979, I got married to Emily. At Sacred Hearts Church on Summit Street. while we at the "Dais" the priest said something funny like being holy. I looked at Louie and we both started to laugh, that the whole church started to laugh and no one knew what, they were laughing about. We had the wedding at "The Rivera" in Coney Island. We had over 300 guests. We had someone from every crime family in New York there! After the wedding, Emily and me left for Texas to meet Louie and Jo. We opened an Italian restaurant, five months after it got going, we came back to Brooklyn.

  When we got back, I went to see Bobby Darrow at Dammamora State Prison, off the Canadian border, with Roy Roy and Jimmy Springers. Jimmy was an old wheel guy for the Gallo's. He was dying from diabetes. They kept cutting off his limbs, but he wouldn't stop smoking. We visited Bobby for a few hours and talked about his case. The place was a hell hole, it was old and it looked like a fort. It had to be the worst prison in the state. How anyone could serve time there was a miracle. That night we went to eat and had a few drinks. Then we went to the hotel where we were staying. It was the only place to stay in town. The place sucked, it was a broken down piece of shit. It was snowing heavily, we went to the back of the place, to go to the room. It had some old long wooden stairs. Roy went first, then Springers, I was last. Roy got to the top, Springers was half way up and his foot got caught in the stairs and his leg came off! and came flying down the stairs hitting me! Jimmy fell on the stairs, Roy was laughing and said to Jimmy "What the fuck are you doing, go get your leg and lets go!" So I brought Jimmies leg to him, he put it on and we went in to the room. Roy busted his balls all night. All Springers did was curse his fucking leg, we laughed all night! In 1980 me, Ricky and Mosh went down to Florida to meet with a good friend. I called Uncle Bobby while we were there. We set up a marijuana deal with some Cubans. We put up seventy-five thousand for a plane and the pot to come in from Haiti. What we didn't know was that while we were setting it, up we were speaking with a DEA special agent! We were having meetings at the "Fontainebleau hotel," then at the "Cricket Club," a private club, Both were in Miami Beach.

  At night we were partying at all the hot spots, during the day on Bobby's cigarette boat, with a ton of broads drinking, and eating like pimps. We got the deal done, a week later, the pilot lands the plane in Florida, unloads the pot into trucks, then everyone gets pinched. I'm the lucky one, I just get a supena. Ricky, Bobby, Mosh, and the pilot all get arrested. Bobby gets special probation, I get the subpena thrown out, and walk away from it free. Ricky and Mosh get three years, with all the appeals, they go to jail in 1984. They go to Allen-wood Federal Prison Camp. They get out July 1987.

  Not long after I got back from Florida we lost President Street. For years the law wanted the Gallo's off President Street and couldn't find a way. It was their homes but when the law wants something, they get it. Illegal or not, when the Borough of Brooklyn decided to put new sewers on President Street between Columbia and Van Brunt Streets they came and ripped up the streets. We knew something was wrong. We had a guy in City Hall that said the new sewers were ordered from way up and it was a way to get the Gallo's off the block. Roy Roy laugh at him.

  A news women named Roseann Scamadella, a local girl from the neighborhood came to the block to interview the home owners. Roy Roy told her to "get off the fucking block or he'll kick her in the ass," she left fast.

  A few weeks later, the pumps that were stopping the water from seeping into the hole that was in the middle of the street, mysteriously stopped pumping, causing the hole to fill up with water undermining all the homes on the block! Water seeped into the foundation, then the city came and condemned all the homes; that was the end of President Street. The law took down a whole block of 100 year old homes. There were only four buildings that were owned by the Gallo crew. The rest of the homes were owned by people who had them in their family for generations. The law didn't care, they got what they wanted.

  I can never forget seeing Mondo up President Street sitting at the window of "Doddo's Club,". His Mom had passed away, he was alone, his home gone, thank God for Doddo, you could see in Mondo's face that it was over, it broke my heart.

  It was time for Bob Weiswasser the Gallo Lawyer, to go, the word was that Bob was into a ton of guys, for a lot of money, for his gambling habit and that he had been a rat since, He represented Bobby Darrow on his murder case and that he sold Bobby down the drain. Maybe even as far back as when he had my Mothers case. So on July 22nd, 1979, Weiswasser was found shot, twice in the back of the head, in his car in Manhattan. That night when I went to Roy Roys club, Ricky, Punchy, Tony B and Roy were smiling and having a toast, "To that cocksucker"! I wouldn't ask, but I knew two of the four took him out.

  At the end of 1981, Louie called me and said that the restaurant in Texas was doing bad, so I said "Close the fucking place and come back home." He just had a daughter Danielle, and I just had my first daughter Kristina. I then said 'we can open a restaurant here,' so I went to Court Street to find a place. I found a store front on Court and Amity Street. While I waited for Louie to get back, I started to build it. Louie got back and we opened in March of 1982. We called it "Brooklyn House of Pasta and Seafood," we all worked it. Louie cooked, and I helped him and learned to cook our menu. Emily and Jo ran the front, we had a ton of people come in and they liked the food. Some nights we had Lou Rauls, the singer, come in. Then the next night, Anthony "Shorty" Mascuzzio, a good fellow from the Gambino family who loved seafood "it was a trip," but we were not making any money and thats not going to work with a family to feed.

  In 1983, I got in touch with one of my street partners and said "I need to make some money," I was getting three to five hundred a week from a drug deal, I put together in 1980. I had the connection that had the stuff and vouched for credit for my new partner. I didn't have to do anything, he did everything. My father just made a connection with a guy from Canada for Qualude 714. The guy started to bring fifty thousand pills a month. I would meet him at the "Sky Way hotel" or the "Jade East Hotel" parking lots. I'd take the bails out of his trunk and into mine and go home. We were paying fifty cents for them and selling them for two dollars each! We were making a ton of money. If you wanted a lude you came to us, and they did, from Long Lsland, New Jersey, Conn. We were rolling along well. But like every one else, we got greedy and put our hands into different shit.

  When someone would ask for it we said we can get it and we did. We were making a lot of money. When I would go to bed at night, I would look at my dresser and see it was starting to tilt. All the cash I was giving Emily, she was stuffin
g it under the dresser till she couldn't get no more in.

  Emily and Me coming out of Church on our Wedding Day

  Blast at my Wedding Reception

  Roy Roy, Uncle Chubby, Eddie Futon on Right, Brothers wife and cousin Debbie Sitting on the left at the Wedding

  Me watching Blast's back at his Wedding Reception

  My Blonde Alibi at Albert Blast' Gallo's Wedding

  Roy Roy, Bobby and Me visting Bobby in prison

  CHAPTER 19

  DIS & DAT LOUNGE

  Ricky and Joe Shep took over a bar in Mill Basin on Mill Avenue in Brooklyn. They bought it from Nicky Tango. My father used to drink there many years ago and was an old friend of Nicky. Dad said it had a dirt road in the old days and he had a ton of fun there. A lot of 'old school' guys would go there, it was like a hideaway then. So when the place went up for sale he grabbed it. We cleaned it up and opened the kitchen. It was doing well, I would work 3 nights a week, my father and Goomba would do the rest of the nights. My cousin Debbie was the coat check girl, she dated Steven Gallo, so he was there often, we also had four barmaids. One of the barmaids was a friend of Sal "Brother" Sorentino he knew her from Red Hook. The girl was dating a drug dealer whose father was even bigger than him, in the drug business, they were all Latin.

  One Friday night I was sick so I called in to see if one of the guys would cover for me. My father said he would be there anyway, that I should stay in bed. That night, two guys came into the bar looking for the barmaid. When she saw them she went over to my father and told him "those guys are bad news." Ricky went over to them and asked them to leave, as soon as he did, they pulled out two pistols and started shooting! They shot Ricky in the face, then shot the barmaid and a girl that was there having a drink! Ricky shot one of them as they ran. The other guy turned and shot Ricky again as they left. Ricky ran down the block ditching the pistol. Then one of the young guys that was at the bar grabbed Ricky and drove him to the hospital. When he got to the hospital he passed out.

  I got a phone call from the bar that there was a shooting, to come over now! As I got there the cops were already there, they had the bar roped off. As I went in, it looked like a war zone. The cops were talking to my cousin Debbie and Jackie Randazzo. The EMS were helping the barmaid, and I saw a body with a cover over it. As I went over, I found out it was a girl who just turned 21 and was out for a birthday drink. She knew no one, she was dead. The cops asked where my father was, I said I didn't know. I went to Jackie, she told me what happened and she thought Ricky was shot and she thinks the other guys were shot too, I didn't know what the fuck to do!

  About an hour later I get a call from the hospital to come right away. Rick DiMatteo was there. When I got there a priest was giving Ricky his last rites and told me he didn't think he would make it. I got dizzy and almost passed out, someone grabbed me. Man I was sick to my stomach. They ran him into surgery. He got shot in the mouth that blew his teeth out and one in the arm that went into his chest and stopped at his heart! Well, he made it through the surgery.

  The next day the detectives came to the hospital and arrested him. When he got better he went to court, and got out on bail, months later he got the case turned around, because he was the victim! Then they wanted him to I.D. the shooters, but he said he didn't see who shot him.

  Here's how it started: We didn't know the barmaid was talking to the cops about her boyfriend's drug dealing, the drug dealers father found out and put a hit on her. They didn't know Ricky owned the bar, if they did they wouldn't have come there. The two guys also got shot and got pinched in the hospital. The barmaid went to court and testified against them, they went to jail for killing the girl and shooting the barmaid. The case against Ricky was thrown out.

  We had a sitdown with the father and was told that when they got out of jail that they would have to pay for the shooting of Ricky and the girl at the bar. They came out years later. They were out only a month when they were both found dead. We knew the father would do the dirty work. Well that pretty much ended the bar.

  After the killing, I got in touch with a guy I knew from when I hung out at "Beef Steak Charles," in Sheepshead Bay. His name was Nicky, we were pretty close.

  I did a lot of drinking there. I used to go with him to drop off the night deposit, he took me because I had a gun, but he treated me well.

  One night I was at the bar talking to some girls that I knew, when I noticed there were two guys behind me and one of them was a real asshole. He was making some gestures behind me at the girls, I noticed the girls were getting nervous so I turned and saw the little guy making faces. I said to him "what the fuck are you doing?" He had this guy with him, as big as a house, he said "you want to fuck with us?". I knocked him out with one punch!, as I leaped for the big guy he put his hands up, not to fight. I didn't know that the guy I hit, hit his head on the foot rail going down and wasn't moving, Nicky grabbed me, we thought the guy was dead! Nicky covered my face with a bar rag and ran me out through the kitchen.

  On the way out, there were a couple of guys that hung out there. They were from the Bay, a little older than me, one said to me, he didn't like what I did. I looked at him and started to confront him, when Nicky told him to back off. I went out the back door, outside a friend of mine, Frankie Horn's cousin was waiting in a car. I jumped in and she took off, we went to a local bar and she hung out with me until she made a call to see what happened to the guy.

  He was hurt pretty bad, but alive, the cops came, he said someone hit him but he didn't know who. Nicky told him he better keep his mouth shut and that 'he was wrong.' His friend told Nicky that the guy was an asshole, the moron then left. So I came back to the bar, I sat with Nicky, he knew the whole story already he just wanted to smooth it out with the guy from the kitchen. I spoke with him, he said that 'its ended,' but I knew he didn't like me, he didn't know I was a close friend of one of his brothers. He found out later and that really ended it, but there was no love, lost.

  Then the big guy wanted to talk to me, I went outside with him. I put my pistol in my suit Jacket pocket. He told me the guy was an asshole and was always getting hit, and that he wanted no problem with me. I said 'fine' then walked away, at the end of the night he came over to me and said he needed a lift home, he had no car. Me, like a fool, I trusted him and drove him home, but in my mind I was ready to shoot him in the face. I got him home, outside waiting, was his father, he jumped out and said he'd hope to see me next week at the bar.

  'I said I don't know, maybe,' and left. On the way home I said, "what a nice guy or a real asshole." I didn't know if I should have shot him or made him a friend.

  A couple weeks later I was at 'Beefteaks,' and heard it was closing. There were a few of us there drinking, we all got drunk and I pulled out a gun and started shooting out the wall lights. There was a guy named Dukie there, a real tough guy, spoke like 'Wolf Man Jack.' He pulled his gun and started to shoot out the lights also. We were having a contest who could shoot out the most lights. Some one noticed there were two tables in the back, and some girls started to scream. Nicky went over to take care of it while me and Dukie ducked under the bar. Like two kids, we got out with no trouble.

  I knew that 'Beefsteaks' was going out of business and that Nicky would be looking for work. He was a good manager and had a big following. I asked Ricky to give him a shot to make 'our' place work, maybe people would think were not there any longer, he said 'OK' So Nicky came in and ran the place. The bar started to make money.

  I came in once in a while, one night I came in with a few of the guys in my crew. The next day Nicky called my father and complained. Ricky called me, and told me that Nicky had a problem with me coming over with the crew and drinking and not paying. Ricky said make sure the guys pay, he didn't want to lose Nicky, I said 'OK,' I came in with Mike the electrician a couple of times. I didn't have to pay for my drinks, Mike went to pay for his drinks, Nicky said 'no charge,' then called me over and said that he didn't mean the thing about the guy
s drinking that he was trying to watch out for the place. I said 'no problem,' then he grabbed me, almost like patting me down, I found that to be a little weird, but who knows.

  The next day Ricky called me and said that he didn't want me going in the bar with the gun, to leave it in the car. I said 'OK,' that night I go do a pickup with Mike and I tell Mile what that motherfucking Nicky did. Mike said Nicky had something up his sleeve.

  A few weeks later Mike and me were out all day drinking and making pickups. It was late at night, I said 'lets go to the bar.' Mike walked in first, Nicky was standing behind the bar near the register.

  Mike went right next to him telling him that I was 'whacked,' as I came in, he looked at me and said "come on don't bust my balls." I took the gun out of my pocket and shot at him twice, one bullet went into the mirror and one went in between Mike and him. As I was about to shoot again I see from the corner of my eye four old people sitting in a booth. I put the gun on the bar, put my hands in the air and said 'sorry.' They got up and ran out of the bar.

  I looked down the bar, I see Mike in the middle of the bar bending up and down with his hands going between his legs, yelling "you know what you did! Ricky's going to be pissed", I laughed. Mike looked really funny doing that. Nicky was all shook up, and said to me "I didn't do nothing," and put a bottle of Scotch in front of me. We drank and I told him he was a fucking rat and stabbed me in the back, I put you here, I said "it's over," and left.