Hi guys. My name is Luigi Di Matti, what I’m about to tell you is gospel truth, but you may not believe me. Online I notice no one believes anyone.

I have no reason to lie online and every now and then, the America vs Luigi Di Matti document appears online listing my 1969 court case. It’s down right now, but it’ll come back. The reason for this comment is, I saw an old comment from 2015 about the Eppolitos! I look online a lot and I found it when I typed Eppolito in Google recently because they were my close friends when I was young; and my idols and fucking tough gangsters, but they’re not even on Wikipedia, whilst in my opinion lesser losers like Henry Hill are everywhere online!! I never met Henry in New York, but I knew Paulie Vario. Personally, he was, shall we say, a violent guy and not at all like the guy in the Goodfellas movie. Anyway, as I said I was searching about the Eppolitos and I found a whopping zero. All the nightclubs they owned, all the hits they pulled off, but nothing. The only thing I found is about Ralphie’s son Louie who was a cop and a killer like his dad, but none about the capos and soldier brothers!! As I was close to all three Eppolitos and the other brother Joey, I knew them VERY well. Joey was not a made guy or an associate, he worked on the docks, but he was tough and he’d always be an alibi if you needed to say you were with him one night whilst out on a job.

I was closest to Ralphie and Freddy Eppolito. I loved Ralphie. The comments here got a lot wrong, so I’m gonna explain it. Who am I? I was born 6/2/1933 in Canarise. My parents, Giuseppe and Assunta were from Messina, Sicily. I became an associate in 1946/7 and I was made on Valentine’s Day 1956. I was initially in the crew of Freddy, but he lost his crew, I kind of bounced about after from crew to crew, spending a lot of time with Carmine the doctor. The comment I read here said Ralph Eppolito was only an associate. That’s not true, Ralph, Jimmy and Freddy were all made men. Ralphie was made, but he was maybe too violent to be a capo. He was a nice guy, but a Murder Inc type, you know, in our life we are all killers, you can’t be made without a murder, but he’d say weird shit like he’s fantasising about killing certain people and women. A fun, but crazy guy!!! Ralphie and Freddy had about 60 hits between them. They’d disappear for a few days, and you’d always read Monday someone got whacked. Ralph was a high ranking soldier, but too crazy to be a capo like his bros. Freddy and James clam were capos, Ralph and Freddy were ruthless killers, but Jimmy not so much. Jimmy was more of a loan shark and into gambling. He was also a good looking guy, a gentleman, but not as vicious as his brothers.

The reason you guys don’t know my name is because I got 70 years in February 1969, for 2 murders and 9 kilos of heroin. I was very close to a couple of guys, I never see mentioned, Epifanio Orio and Charlie Barcellona, two made guys in another Gambino crew. They and I were into drugs. Alfred Eppolito was also into drugs, but he got caught by the feds and demoted. He taught me the ropes of the mafia and drugs. The Eppolitos were big names in New York and close to Carlo initially. Their father was also a mobster, his name I forget but apparently he was huge in the bootlegging days, with lucky Charlie Lucania and Frank Costello. I got on very well with the Eppolitos. They were great guys, very fun to be around. Ralph was a tough tough guy, proper ruthless killer. I was only a soldier and when I got arrested for heroin. After, I was basically shelved. What I mean by that is, I was a big earner, made guy, when I got jailed, no one really visited. In jail I a saw a lot of Gambinos over the years, most didn’t even know I was a made guy., or who I was. I was released in September 2013. I now live in Florida. Any questions you have about the Gambinos during the fifties and sixties, I’ll answer with pride. My story is a tough one because I got to the top, but I have little to show for it. My bank account and funds, luckily, made me get released a comfortable guy, financially! My memory is quite good, despite my age, so I can give an honest opinion on any Gambinos and others from the fifties/sixties. It seems bizarre for me reading about DeMeo and Gotti everywhere, I never met any of them. When I was made, the Gambinos were different from other families, because we were about business, whilst the Columbos, Luccheses were like cowboys, fucking whacking everyone doing crazy stupid shit shaking down shops, just not doing more legit union stuff and legitimate businesses like us. There was just so much money in drugs, many of us got involved. I was getting Heroin from Columbia from a Spanish guy I met in jail. It was very easy to move it, drop it off and take the money. I was picking it up so cheap and selling it in bulk for almost 100% profit, so I was dressing in designer suits, hats, spending thousands on drugs, prostitutes, clothes, cars. I was a smart dresser. I always wore check suits, hand painted tie. A lot of blue shirts, black shirts with grey suit, black tie. I was an impressive gangster about town. And a crazy motherfucker to boot. I’d work my legitimate business 9-5 everyday, I had a clothes shop, 3 grocery stores, 2 bars, 3 nightclubs, but weekends I’d disappear all weekend, doing drugs with whores for 36 hours. I got in trouble a few times by my capos for going AWOL. 😂 I was selling kilos to the LA family, Chicago, Saint Louis. I loved the mob meetings where crews from across the country would meet, cos I’d find customers. You can’t just walk up to a mob guy and introduce yourself, another friend of ours has to do the introduction, so I was always getting Carlo to introduce me to bosses and asking them to introduce me to their crews. Carlo loved me, cos my dad was from Sicily and I speak Italian. Carlo used to hand me numbers rackets, because he wanted me to be success. Through Carlo, I had 350,000 on the streets in numbers. I was a good earner, from the day I got made, I was kicking up $40 to 50 thou a month to my capo and my stock was high when I wasn’t doing crazy shit!!! In the fifties 40 thou was like 150 thou now. I knew a lot of guys on the street from all 5 families.

To this day, I don’t know if I was ratted or what, but the two murders I got jailed for, there was minimal proof, mo witnesses. No one really helped me. My heart sunk when I heard seven zero years. I never ratted to get time off! Nino Gaggi I knew, he was a prick. Nino was a guy that was just hard to like, he was a capo, so I had to respect him, but a dodgy prick. Carlo gave me rackets with him, but he was just a strange guy. I just naturally could not stand him, I found him to be creepy and sly. He’s just a two faced ass licker, just a horrible slimy guy. My eyes are quite bad now, but if you want to ask questions I’ll answer.

I ran with so many made guys that are not anywhere on the internet. There were a lot of made Gambinos, but not many were earners or killers. So many aren’t online. We had a big family. If you went out in New York un the sixties, you’d see Gambinos everywhere. I was a popular guy way back, but my best friends were definitely made guys Jovanni DeRigi, Giuseppe Rispaldi, Epifanio Orio and the Eppolitos, especially Ralphie. He kinda took me under his wing. He was about 10/15 years older than me and a guy always ready to do work. Hits never bothered Ralphie.

I was an earner, but not a killer. I did kill a few guys, but none of my murders haunt me, I was doing my job. I was more about getting girls. I made my bones, I did some nasty shit. A lot of burning down houses with people inside, but I wasn’t an outright killer. I did work if I was given it, but I wasn’t one of those guys that enjoyed it. You know, in the life you get those guys, they’ll whack anyone over anything. That just wasn’t me, I forgave a few things, when perhaps really, I should have killed those guys. I was more a ‘bullet in the back of the head’ when they don’t expect it kinda guy, if I had to do work.

I was always more interested in women, than killing. I’ve got 2 sons 2 daughters from 4 women. Carlo didn’t like that shit, but I was cool with Carlo until I got busted with drugs. After that I never saw him again. Paulie took over, a guy I never liked, so my mob life was over. Aside from selling huge quantities of heroin, I was smoking it a lot too with prostitutes through the 60s. My mob nickname was, ‘Good Looking Lu’, I was a handsome barstard, a hazel eyed Elvis Presley and I used it to good effect, I must’ve had 1000 women, 2 marriages and 4 kids. 300 of that 1000 were prostitutes I smoked heroin with haha 😂!

After my heroin arrest, I was basically black listed. Only Aniello visited me. Aniello loved me, cos I killled a guy that was ratting him. That hit got me made. That made my bones. Joe Gallo, the Columbo guy, the guy I shot, who was a made guy, was ratting on him too, so I became close to him and Larry much later. When I pulled that hit to get made, Joe Gallo and Aniello Dellacroe were in jail. It was like the film Godfather, because we were drinking in the club of Sonny Franzese and you had to hand your guns to staff at the entrance. I had a gun hidden in the toilet like the movie, Godfather. It was known by everyone what was gonna go down. I never met Albert Gallo, sadly, I’m sure he was un-made when I met Joe and Larry. One Columbo/Gallo guy I was close to who was with them during the war, was Gennaro Ciprio. A big fat guy, he was a great cook and I loved his food, he was so proud of his cooking ability and his food was divine. He was only an associate I think, but a scary guy. A fucking tough guy, but decent and solid if you knew him. All those guys are dead! I outlived so many.

I have to be honest, my Costa Nostra life wasn’t flattering. 25 years in the life as a soldier and an earner and 43 years in jail. I’m not a guy they’ll make a film of. I could go on, but I’m tired, write me with questions about the sixties I’ll answer. Any Gambino stuff or the Gallos I know a lot. Not so much other families, but I met so many people back then, maybe I’ll have info . I might write a book soon, I’m getting old now, my light is dimming so it must be NOW.