So the crack explosion really took the mob by surprise as it did most people and by the time they would have realised ho much money was been made, the crews selling the crack had become too powerful for the mob to exploit.
Is there any stories where they had mixed together, either in night clubs or in jail? With the racist attitudes of the time, you would think the two groups would have come into conflict at some point.
Also as a side point "Only built for cuban links" the album by Raekwon was heavily mafia influenced and very popular in its time. I wonder how the crack dealers viewed the mafia at the time and would they have shown the respect when coming into contact with them?
There were a lot of crack rings and organisations operating in the city at that time, i don't see how they could exploit it anymore than the dealers themselves.
Gambino turncoat andrew didonato claims to have shaken drug dealers down in brooklyn. However he doesn't really give much detail.
Another guy who was around into the 90s was ronald bumps basset who ran ran large numbers racket and heroin distribution was a contemporary of fat cat nichols may have had some lcn ties cause they both used to work for pops freeman who was allegedly affiliated with the genovese family. Whether or not he continued that relationship into the 80s i don't know. He was actually convicted again in 2013 for heroin trafficking.
