New book reveals John Gotti’s role in ‘Goodfellas’

http://nypost.com/2015/07/12/new-book-reveals-john-gottis-role-in-goodfellas-murder/

Sounds like a crap book. I think it was Tommy Agro that killed Desimone? not sure on that one.
And wasn't Gotti capo in 1979? Why would a capo do the dirty work?
And the article says Hill got it from Polisi, so not really a credible source.
But still thanks for the link Azguy.

The only murders I've heard gotti being personally involved in r the murders of vito borelli and Anthony plate , I think this is bullshit

Reporters just love to work that name "Gotti" into just about every mob story, so who knows if it's true?

This has always been a bullshit rumor created by henry hill. Now foxy jerothe was a underling of gotti and tommy killed him in 74. I have no doubt that gotti wanted tommy dead and probably was involved in some way. However i doubt he was the triggerman. Tommy agro was most likely the killer. Joseph spione who was related to tommy was most likely killed by the bergin crew. Im still not sure if gotti ever pulled the trigger. He was involved in the mcbratney murder but ralph galione was the triggerman. He was involved in the tony plate murder but willie boy johnson and angelo were probably the killers. Vito borelli seems like another rumor. I think demeo took care of him like he did frank amato. John favara was on his orders but he was in florida to create a alibi

Henry isn't a credible source either.

Anthony plate was the most likely if there was one

possibly. I still think willie boy took care of that. Plate was a psycho but he was 66 years old so they probably didnt need 3 guys especially the acting capo of the crew

Nick Pileggi finished "Wiseguy" in late 1985. The first editions were released on a limited basis in December of 1985, just before Big Paul was hit and the book went national in January of 1986. This is very easy to research. Check with the library of congress, or if you have a first addition check the date.

My point is, it's funny how Hill left all of this bullshit out of the first book. Yet when Gotti became the most visible gangster since Capone, Hill slowly but surely had more and more to say about him. At first, on shows like Geraldo, wearing the stupid rubber nose, fake beard, and hat.

There's a reason that Pileggi had nothing to do with "Gangsters and Goodfellas" or this latest pile of shit, and it's not because he didn't like Hill. By all accounts he did. It's because he knew this was all a bullshit money grab, and he'd have no part in ruining his reputation as a journalist.

Verdict: Bullshit.

agreed PB. I do think gotti was involved in the planning of the murder but i doubt he was present much less personally responsible

Yep, as I said in another thread, all you have to do is listen to him make up bullshit on the Stern show when he's wasted. One day he has never killed anyone and the next day (when he's loaded) he ice picked 3 guys in the back of the head. And once you've said all you know, you have to start making up bullshit to keep yourself interesting.

By the way in this video he tells the same story and says "How true it is, I don't know". https://youtu.be/BC54xF3veME (around 22 mins). Sounds like a pretty shaky premise for a book.

Gonna paste the same thing I posted to other forums:

The real Tommy DeSimone doesn't quite deserve to have the name he has in crime history. If it weren't for the fact that Joe Pesci is capable of being so funny and so scary on camera, very few people would know that DeSimone exists. So it's obvious that whoever is behind this book is mooching off the reputation created by Goodfellas. This fact alone is a testimonial to Pesci's talent, I guess. The writers should send Pesci royalties.

I don't know the true story about any of this .
But it sure sounds like good old Henry wanted some more cash and camera time..

Same thing with how Hill talks about Karen. Since they divorced and how he tried to get back in the limelight, Hill started making claims about her and trying to make her a whore. He added that story about her having an afair with Vario and almost getting raped by Desimone. The guy abuses what Pileggi and Scorsese gave to get money and get back at people.

well to be fair the claim about desimone attackinf karen may be true. Desimone was known to be violent toward women, thats what caused his feud with foxy

Well this guys a idiot but trying to cash in first. The guy asoros cousin was actually in on the plot and will testify everything. Then therewill be alot of books. I don't like the surprise Tommy at the table kind of think the movie nailed it. walk in a empty room boom rolled in plastic and deleo probaly choose him up. Thought agro took the credit to. Killed 2 brothers and threaten the 3rd to trifecta that's crazy.

Good post, Ivan. The thing is, the same can be said for ninety percent of the characters in that book. Most of them were bottom feeding lowlifes, whose violent deaths would have ended in anonymity on page thirty of the Daily News if they weren't resurrected and immortalized by Hill, Pileggi and Scorsese (and I firmly believe that several of the minor characters were composites).

Hell, half the characters in the movie are composites.

As far as I have been able to gather "Tommy" played by Joe Pesci is a composite of Tommy DeSimone, a couple of Paul Vario's sons, and Robert "Bobby Cabert" Bisaccia. The Bisaccia characterization was shoehorned in by Pesci (Cabert had nothing to do with Hill, Burke, et al) just because Pesci thought he was funny ("like a clown", I guess).

Another example of a composite is the "Frankie Carbone" character, who is a combo of Paolo LiCastri, Angelo Sepe, and Richard Eaton.

I know too much about this shit. Imagine if I spent this brainpower on something worthwhile?

agreed pizz, sounds liked hyped up horseshit to me. sounds like some shit ed scarpo or kenji gallo would write lol

agreed. Unfortunetly movies especially based on mobsters tend to glorify them. I remember that gotti movie made him out to be a robin hood figure which made me laugh how inaccuarate it was

Ironically, Ed Scarpo and that scumbag Cicale are co-writing an ebook about it. Cicale claims to have inside knowledge.

Newsflash: Cicale was ten fucking years old when they took off Lufthansa .

But let's not get started on those guys because I'm having a good day so far .

All true.


No more than most guys who take an interest in researching this stuff. Reading too much is nothing to be embarrassed about. Most of the shit I post is from being an almost 56-year-old man who grew up in a neighborhood where you didn't have much of a choice about knowing these guys. Getting involved with them? Now that's a choice .

in the book "the Sinatra club" sal polisi says that gotti came to him and told him they were going to whack desimone, and gotti asked polisi to come along with them, polisi declined, he was asked because he was foxy jethroe best friend,

so gotti did have a hand in desimone's killing. also I think it's true that vario would not let gotti kill jimmy burke,he was too good as an earner, but, all in all henry hill always was a big liar, and this new book is probably 85 percent fiction.

That's if you believe Polisi. He's another bottom-feeding lowlife and liar.

No offense, Binnie. And I'm not saying this because you're from a very rural part of the country. But you take these lowlifes at their word too easily. Anyone can get a ghostwriter and make a bunch of lies sound real.

I threw that book away on around the tenth page when Polisi said that "we" hit John F. Kennedy. I literally threw it into the fireplace. He's a lowlife rat, and he wouldn't have been privy to such information even if it were true.

I heard Gotti was the second gunman on the grassy knoll.

gotti had a hand in it BUT he probably wasnt directly involved

yes,polisi was trying to sound like he was somebody, as they all do, but, he still wasn't as bad as low-life henry hill.

Rats are lying pieces of shit, makes it even funnier how some guys believe rats words, and fbi files, when half the time its all bull shit.

I recently came across some information of a 1961 killing of 2 black guys. They were deadbeat gamblers killed on the orders of Carmine Fatico. It says the killers were John Gotti and Willie boy Johnston. Anyone ever hear anything about this one before?

Polisi claiming to be a part of the Marcello or Trafficante family? lol that's the only two I thought were rumored to be involved?

I haven't heard that. Sounds like bullcrap to me though.

yeah I read that some where before gotti killed a few people that for sure

Polisi's a bottom-feeding lowlife, and as big a liar as the rest of them. "The Sinatra Club" was half a rehash, half bullshit.

Just like Hill's original biography, "Wiseguy," Polisi's original biography, "Sins of the Father," written in 1989 by Nick Taylor, didn't mention half the shit that Polisi has come out with lately (just like Hill added all of this new bullshit to this book). Hill's a liar, even in death. And in a similar fashion, Polisi was capitalizing on names that are back in the media again. But that interest will eventually wane because the people who really take an interest in this stuff are tired of the repetitive bullshit, and the rest of the reading public doesn't give two shits about the Mafia in 2015.

And speaking of "The Sinatra Club," I don't care how much they needed the money. Any Italian American associated with that movie should be drawn and quartered for the terribly overdone stereotypes. Especially Danny Nucci as Gotti---although he has a cute wife, Paula Marshall, who played the NYU reporter who "outed" George and Jerry as a gay couple on "Seinfeld."

The only solace I take in that film is that it probably cost about a case of beer and a few large pies to make, and it went "straight-to-video" and grossed about twelve dollars. People aren't stupid. Unfortunately, when it comes to this subject (LCN in America), a lot of people are still naive.

Had SUCH a crush on this girl growing up. My all time favourite of the 'Seinfeld girls'.

for those that dont know:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GMZjkNW5b8

Plain pies too. All kidding aside, the naivety comment is spot on.

Why is it necessary to link Gotti physically to bodies? it's as if it's necessary to keep this myth about him going. Everyone knows he ordered executions; that came right from his mouth. Whether or not he did the actual heavy lifting in any case before/after Castellano murder is immaterial.

Take the murdering aspect out of LCN. Look at forest thru the trees. It's a pretty safe assessment that he sucked as a boss. He wasn't secretive, he wasnt a brilliant racketeer, he wasn't a prolific murderer, he wasn't a big earner. He was a public persona/stereotype of what mob guys are. And it was innaccurate for both the times he lived in AND the history of the mob.

He was as strong as the people around him. No one is arguing that Dellacroc, Gravano and Decicco butressed his position. I think that hip hop artists in the 90s and the media played a big role in creating this myth about Gotti. The more I learn about him, the less impressed I become.

And anyone, especially anyone writing books, looking to perpetuate this myth is out for a money grab...

She's gotta be fifty now and she still looks fucking great. I remember reading somewhere that she's four or five years older than her husband.

If that doesnt do it for you, you play for the other team.

Not that there's anything wrong with that

That has to be one of the best Seinfeld episodes ever made. Constanza is fucking hilarious. "Do you wanna have sex with me right now? Come on let's go!"

Hahaha yea it is..Kosmo comes in and goes "I tbought we were gonna take a steam together...well I dont wanna sit there naked by myself!"

Always thought she was hot. .. but Cindy the hooker/maid and Tawney Kittain as the dumb aspiring actress may have been hotter at the time..... but they likely didn't hold up as well as Paula here....

Know Gotti the way we do, he was an egotistic maniac and always wanting to prove how tough he was. I'm sure he personally pulled the trigger on many people just to show the guys around him....

All jokes and bullshit aside though with or without Gotti present for the murder, is it not generally assumed that Tommy Agro killed Tommy DeSimone? I know the info came from that rat fuck Joe Dogs but even still didn't Agro go around literally bragging about killing two DeSimone brothers even joking about killing the 3rd brother and going for the "hat trick" or "three peat" or something like that?

I was just talking about that book on another board when this story broke. And you're correct, that's where that story originated from, the book "Joe Dogs." However, it was never introduced into evidence at any of Agro's trials. But then again, the Feds could have been holding onto it, but being that Agro died so young they never got a chance to use it. But in my opinion, in legal terms it was all hearsay anyway (even if it was true).

I love that book for one reason: It paints a perfect picture of the wiseguy hangouts in Southeast Florida back in the late '70s and early '80s. I was just a kid in my early 20's, but I remember them well.

We didn't buy our place in Delray Beach until '97, and we didn't really start splitting our time between New York and Florida until around 2006. But I've been visiting that general area all my life, and the author really nailed it. Especially the Diplomat in Hallandale. Today it's ginormous, on par with the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach. But back then it was small, homey, and wiseguy central.

When my Mom and Dad would visit Chuck Teemer, who lived in Hollywood, Chuck would always put them in a suite at the Diplomat.

Mom and Dad had also experience in the Fontainebleau, but always said the Diplomat was just as luxurious.

not necessarily. Sure he was a tough guy but a triggerman...im not so sure. I really havent seen any evidence. So far the only 2 murders that he may have been personally involved in were mcbratney and plate murders. In mcbratneys case ralph galione was the triggerman. In the plate murder willie boy johnson was most likely the killer with assistance from angelo and maybe gotti

jesus christ... more lufthansa stuff? possibly the most played out, re-hashed organized crime topic ever. now Cicale is weighing in? not taking away anything from his career as a gangster, but what the fuck could he possibly have to contribute? any info he has is like 3rd or 4th hand gossip. even his mentor and his mentor's mentor had nothing to do with it. its like the fuckin hoffa assassination. 2 bit wiseguys get a few drinks in them, start talking about the good old days when they were relevant, and claim they know what happened to JFK and know where Hoffa's body is ("they'll never find him" with a wink added on for good measure)

i say enough with lufthansa. put it to bed, they're making it seem like every hustler in ENY/ozone park was involved and got a cut. the dollar amount for the time was big but other than that there wasnt anything impressive about it.

the only new lufthansa relevations id consider believing are the asaro/massino bonanno connections, but even that is thin. massino demanding tribute? he was a knockaround guy at the time, selling christmas trees on the street a few years before

The "Dip" as we used to call the Diplomat Hotel was the greatest.....,

I worked there all the time. Played Steve and Edie, Mel Torme', Buddy Greco, Vic Damone, Dolly Parton, Liza and on and on. The big shows were in the Cafe Crystal, off to the right you had the "Tack Room".

The Tack room was the gangster room. That was they're hangout. They allways had at least a 7 to 10 piece show band in there. Then there was a little lounge right next to the Cafe Crystal, a littlr tiny place where an accordian player named Lou Tully worked for years.

Then you had Oscar the doorman. Super nice guy, I think he had been there since they built the place.

I watched then blow it up from a friend apartmen from across the street. It was so. so sad to watch all those wonderful memories turn to dust.

Now its a big flashy piece of shit. No personality, looks just like every other hotel. The is absolutely no live music in there anymore. When it first opened they had Sinatra Jr. there. This was about 13 years ago maybe longer.

I haven't worked there since.

Bless you Irwin Cowan wherever you are........

Sal

yeah that how he become a capo and then the boss

http://www.oddee.com/item_99420.aspx

Sal and Henry seem like bullshit artists, but why the hell would they write about Gotti before Sparks? Average person dont give a shit about your average Gambino Capo now or 30 years ago. Everyone who claims they were alive then would know Gotti wasn't known before that and it is possible these guys didnt think including stories about Gotti would make a difference in say March of 1985. Adding him in 1989 would garner interest from the same people who followed him in news all the time. Not saying these guys are credible but when people say "ohh they bring up Gotti now" like if they knew shit about him writing it before sparks wouldn't have changed nothing or sold another book except maybe Gotti himself buying one.