Sure in NY, but also on an international scale??
Like others said before in this thread, Cali/Gambino have the connections to Canada, 'Ndrangheta and their cousins in Sicily..
Does the Westside/Bellomo still have a lot of influence outside of the NY metropolitan area??
If we're talking outside the extended NY metro area, which reaches as far north as the northern suburbs and southern Connecticut and as far south as central New Jersey, you could also add parts of Massachusetts and Florida where the family still has a presence.
So do you think these guys have much to do with families like new england, philly or detroit?
There is still connections with New England and Philadelphia because of the geographic proximity. Not so much Detroit at this point.
@Pmac
What did you think about that Queens/Calabrian cocaine bust that the papers loosely tried to connect to the Genovese?
I thought it very interesting because they got involved at all, indeed why would they?
I thought it might be a response to the Gambinos getting in on the action in Ontario.
Also interesting to me were the roles played "allegedly" by the NY families.
Supposedly the Gambinos provided the South American connections for the Calabrian family, the Mexicans provided the "transport service" so to speak. But now this was direct to Italy, not Canada.
The Queens thing looks like the Calabrians bought the Coke IN NEW YORK WHOLESALE, probably from the Zetas, probably a little more expensive than getting it from South America, but this cost is probably offset from them having their OWN TRANSPORTS, and connections to the Calabrian docks.
The thing is, according to the papers, they were using Genovese money to actually BUY the Coke, as they had the Genovese as financiers. This tells me that amongst the Calabrian families, it's kind of a free for all. There is a hierarchy among the top bosses to divide up, basically whole territories like Australia, and Germany, Toronto what have you, but you have to get by on your own resources and connections. There might be alliances among families that get remade and broken continuously, kinda like the [BadWord] reportedly getting in bed with Calabrians.
Here is a quote from Giovanni Falcone illustrating why I see the drug thing as a critical focal point.....
“Whenever I come across such exponential figures, I remember what Giovanni Falcone told a group of students: “In order to understand how prosperous the drug trade is, consider that a thousand lire invested in drugs on the first of September become a hundred million by the first of August of the following year.” His example was recorded in hundreds of school notebooks.
They had the Gambino thing as 500 keys worth a billion retail. Take a tenth of that, that's 100 million. Take a quarter of THAT that's 25 million. Do that 10 times ( ten shipments) and you are still talking 250 million. It just seems to me a family operating large scale narcotics operations will have more earning potential than a family NOT operating a large scale narcotics operation, this is the only component that has me ranking Cali higher than a WestSide guy.
Drugs are like a financial virus, lol
I know the Genovese are the savvy ones, but they MUST look at that action and feel SOME kind of way......
Okay I got a question for the West Side experts, the Genovese had the Miami docks right? Why did they never get in on the cocaine bonanza? Wait, never mind, those docks were probably too closely watched after awhile' I just remembered Cocaine Cowboys and the Air Drops and all that....
One last question, what exactly are the extent of the Genoveses Union connections in the greater NY area? I know construction is going nowhere (it seems to be a corrupt industry everywhere, America, Canada, Italy, Nigeria, kinda interesting in itself) but what else generates comparable income? I know NY has endless locals for everything under the sun from drivers to doormen to janitors, to painters, bartenders, whatever...
The financial backing rumors by the Genovese regarding that Queens bust is interesting. A couple Genovese associates were among the many charged back in the 2008 Project Reckoning bust that targeted the Gulf Cartel and Ndrangheta.
You look at the cases over the past 15 years and the Genovese have had their own drug cases. However, comparatively speaking, they don't seem to be as deeply involved in the drug trade as the Gambinos. This jives with comments made by different people in law enforcement that have talked about the family maintaining more involvement in sophisticated labor racketeering schemes and influence in legitimate industries than the others.
While I do think the Gambinos have the biggest stake in the drug trade of any of the NY families, I don't think it's so big that it would put them ahead of the Genovese in money or power. And indeed, according to law enforcement and mob experts, it doesnt. The Genovese are considered to be the wealthier and more powerful of the two families.
Your question about the Genovese and the Miami docks illustrates the difference with them. And the same point could be made about their presence on the NY/NJ waterfront too. To them, it's more important to maintain their position there, which they have for almost a century, then to risk it all by making quick money (even a lot of it) by smuggling drugs. Drugs have a high reward but it's also very high risk. The Genovese prefer to maintain control of key ILA locals and everything that goes with that - extortion payments from waterfront businesses, kickbacks from ILA members, bid-rigging for contracts, union jobs for family and friends, etc.
To answer your other question, if you look at the Genovese union cases over the past 15 years, there's been the ILA on the waterfront, various unions in construction - Carpenters, Laborers, Operating Engineers, Elevator Constructors, Roofers, etc, also some Teamsters locals, as well as various miscellaneous locals - Bakery, Confectionary & Tobacco, Newspaper, Food & Commercial Workers, and so on. They, more than any other family, have been successful at maintaining their union clout and the resulting influence in industries like the waterfront, construction, demolition, trucking, waste hauling, recycling, etc.
The Genovese do have some involvement in the drug trade. But their money, power and position as the top family come more from 1) controlling the largest bookmaking and loansharking operations in the greater NY metro area, and 2) having the most labor union clout and legitimate industry influence remaining. And, within the LCN sphere, those are more important than narcotics. Let's not forget that the LCN has been marginalized in the drug trade to a great extent. So it's important not to overvalue Cali's international connections or whatever.
