I know in the old days when the mafia was at its peak in terms of power, witnesses were easier to reach. I'm curious though if anyone here knows of the mafia getting to a witness or informant in more recent times? When watching documentories, informants often have their voices disguised and we only see their silhouette, but is that really necessary. For example yesterday I was watching a documentory about the Lucheses and Vic and Gas. Al D'Arco was on there and all we could see was his silhouette and his voice was computerised. Do you think there is really a legitimate threat that he would be tracked down by a Luchese soldier and whacked?

I do however remember reading something about the Gambino's going after Sammy the bull but Sammy was rearrested and the Gambino guys were caught before they could get the job done.

Thank you all for your time.

Al D'Arco hurt a lot of guys. These guys have families and friends. It doesn't matter what year it is, Al D'Arco has a good reason to be careful. Most, if not all of the mob informants out there are considered targets.

Vinny, have you heard of one getting whacked in the last 20 years though? IMO this rarley happens as know one was a bigger target than Gravano and they couldn't even get to him. Is it a matter of them not caring, not having enough reach or what?

Them not caring? If you're a mob guy and your sent away for life because you got betrayed by your friends, you would not care? I think they all care. I'm sorry, but that's a ridiculous assumption.

The reason why they haven't been able to get many in the past 20 years or so, has a lot do with the state of the mob. They don't appear to have the same resources they used to have. Then there's also the informants themselves. They are usually very careful. If they knew where Mikey Scars or Sal Vitale were located, they would send somebody to take them out. In a heartbeat. They were very close to getting Gravano. They missed him by a [BadWord] hair.

Of course the guys who got put away would care, but Im talking about the guys on the street. Do you really think they would care enough to risk going away for life because of someone who ratted on another guy 20 years ago? Especially if the guy who got a life sentance wasn't a relative or a close friend.

Like I said certainly family members and the guys who got burned would care but I question how much motivation the guys still on the street have.

Do you know the details of the attempt to get to Gravano Vinny? If you do I would really appreciate it if you could share as it sounds interesting.

A high level mobster usually has many friends. I can't speak for every guy out there, but from what I've heard and read in indictments, most of them care about informants. These guys are animals. Many of them would absolutely love to find out where these informants are held up. Not just to kill them, but to torture them as well.

Ive often wondered why they don't make a rule that at sitdowns everyone has to strip down to there birthday suits to make sure no one is wearing a wire or that if you turn out to be an informer then your family is fair game. I know usually families and women are off limits but if they made an acception for rats I'm sure their wouldn't be nearly as many.

Vinny, can you fill me in on the Gambino's going after Sammy the bull.

Bottom line, the risk of going after a witness after the damage has already been done outweighs the rewards. Where the mob is still willing to kill, in the case of rats, is if they suspect somebody is informing or about to flip.

Now I'm willing to bet there are a ton of wiseguys out there who disagree with you. Nothing has hurt this life more than informants. If they knew where a majority of these guys were, they would go after them. Whether they've testified or not. It would make the next guy think twice about cooperating. There has even been heavy discussion about going after the families of informants.

look at what henry hill claimed.....that some one raped him with a dildo in nebraska after a night of hard drinking and video taped it

If Henry Hill got popped, it would definitely shake up people. That's headlines. Even if most of the guys Henry put away are long gone. I hate to give advice to the mafia, but if they want to survive they better go after the informants and they better go after them hard. One of the key reasons, The Bonannos didn't have a rat for so many years was the level of violence they brought when it's members made mistakes. They even cut Sonny Black's arms off for shaking hands with an FBI agent.

In the most recent cases, we've gotten transcripts of taped conversations where high level mobsters are talking about this very thing. Most of them seem to recognize the problem.

Did he really claim to have been raped?

he claimed in a bar in Nebraska that 2 wannabe gangsters waited until he was too drunk to defend himself (and prob druged up on his own account) that they abducted him and raped him with a dildo while videotaping it. it might not have ever happend but he did claim this. it was also speculation in the book "the big heist" about the lutaphsa robbery that henry hill also bedded down another man in bed while karen hill was in another room doing speedballs.

Who's to say that no one in the WITSEC Program was ever murdered?

If they were, the Government would NEVER make it public. Once it was proven that they couldn't protect one witness, their credibility would be shot with all other potential witnesses.

Admitting their failure would be lose-lose for them.

What sort of brain trust exists in the Cosa Nostra of the past 3-4 decades that would know how to find people that the government didn't want to be found?

Even if they could do things like that in order for it to be a deterrent, it would have to be very loud and very public so that everyone would know who got taken out and why they got taken out.

That would embarass the government and make them that much more aggressive in going after the Mob. The short term gain wouldn't be worth the long term cost. Not to mention that personal self-interest dictates that the people who took over when some boss or captain went down might not want to risk their own liberty to make a point-especially if as is quite possible they didn't even like the guy whose job they now have.

RICO and Witness Protection make it a losing game for the people at the top. The smart folks would have gone corporate-legitimate-much like the theme repeated in Puzo's books. Less hassle and probably more money.

I agree. As I said to Vinny, I could see someone who had a close friend or family member put away for life holdiong a grudge to perhaps go after a rat but for the most part I think the guys are way too greedy to risk life imprisonment and spend their resources going after a rat. Not to say that it would be wise for a guy like D'Arco or Sammy the Bull to hanging out in Bensonhurst. I could however see the mob implementing a rule that family members are fair game if you turn rat though. I think that would detour alot of would be turn coats.

You bring up a valid point Lilo and I'm sure there are many mob guys who don't care if guys got locked up, as long as they're free. Like I've said many times, it's greed and selfishness that has been the root of the problem. But judging by what we've heard from these recorded conversations, the guys at the top seem to recognize this problem and especially the guys that have truly done hard time. Guys like Skinny Teddy Persico, Matthew Madonna, Sonny Franzese, all guys in powerful positions and all guys who most likely would not think twice about assassinating an informant if they knew their location. Didn't Franzese put out a hit on his own son? I don't think there's any limits for guys like that. These men may be a dying breed, but they're out there and they appear to be revered by their young followers.

I also have to echo what pizzaboy said. The government would NEVER disclose information about some murdered informant they were protecting.

A good example of what I'm talking about is a guy like Peter "Petey Caps" Caporino. He and his gambling operation was associated with the Genovese family in New Jersey. He wore a wire, recording hundreds of conversations, which resulted in the arrest of several Genovese guys including captain Larry Dentico back in 2005. As surprising as it is, Caporino didn't enter witness protection and move half way across the country. He stayed right in New Jersey and continued to run his gambling operation; obviously still very much within the reach of the Genovese family.

Some would ask why this was. It's not like the Genovese didn't know where he was or couldn't get to him. And, as evidenced by guys like Ralph Coppola, Al Bruno, Larry Ricci, Rudy Izzi, William Marcucci, etc., it's not like the Genovese don't have the stomach to kill people anymore. It's because the risks outweigh the rewards once the damage has already been done.

American Mafia isn't like astreet gangs as Los Zetas, is more important for them not getting the attention of the police, keeping a low profile. Sammy Gravano was in jail in 1997 because it was selling ecstasy in Arizona, Vinny Palermo manages its stripclub in Texas, and has also appeared in the newspaper, Henry Hill is out of the Witness Protection Program from the late 80's and so on. Today it is better to prevent the damage, killing the informants, but after the damage has been done, it makes no sense to kill the witnesses, this differentiates the American Mafia, from the Sicilian, as so far not applied the concept of ''vendetta trasversale'' or''Cross revenge''; to Buscetta when witnesses, killed 14 family members, at another witness murdered the son of 8 / 10 years and broke up in acid, an Italy a woman who left the witness protection, was killed and dissolved in acid by the father of her daughter.

So Furio, it is more common for witnesses to get whacked in Italy than it is in North America? Do they have an Italian witness protection program?

Give it time though, he still might get taken out.

Yes , mussolini14 in Italy we have a witness protection program, only that we also have five mafia (the Camorra, the Mafia, Ndrangheta, etc.), which in terms of violence and infiltration in the state, exceeds considerably the American organized crime.

Yeah I must say that amazes me. I don't see how you (Ivy) can say the risks outweigh the rewards when you're talking about an organized crime family. Let me play devil's advocate here. Now you want to do anything to protect that family and you do that by making an example out of people who don't play by the rules. Last I heard, snitching was a no no, in any form. What kinda message does this send when a guy can snitch on your family and not worry about any repercussions? Whether the damage is done or not. They didn't hesitate to take out Larry Ricci and he wasn't even a rat. I don't know why they haven't taken Caporino out, but isn't he in jail as we speak? There has to be a good reason.

I agree, the guy must be in jail or be surrounded by body gaurds. If he really is responsible for putting made guys in jail including a captian I find it really hard to believe he is out running a gaming room with impunity. I could be wrong but I really think there is more to the story. Sure the mob doesn't kill as often as they once did but it's not like they implemented a "no killing" rule. They are all about money and rats/snitches cost them large so if they don't give people a good reason not to snitch IE-penelty of death, it will costs them much more in the long run than it would to make an example of a snitch.

There were rats and dry snitches even back when the mob did kill there and there was no witness protection program in place. So killing a guy like Caporino now won't change that. It will just bring down that much more heat. As I've said before, where the mob is still willing to kill rats is before they flip. That way, they can stop the damage before it's done and it's worth the risk. Al Bruno being a good example. This isn't the 1930's anymore. The mob has to take a much more practical approach.

And there are other ways to still get killed. Larry Ricci's mistake was refusing to take a plea deal in the ILA/New Jersey waterfront case. The Genovese family wants to foster the idea that the mob is gone from the docks. A mobster like Ricci sitting at the defense table with ILA officials is exactly what they wanted to avoid. Plus, he was supposedly already in disfavor by talking too much about the Genovese family's plans to move down further in to the Philadelphia family's territory in South Jersey. So, needless to say, he ended up in a trunk.

There was talk about both Ralph Coppola and Rudy Izzi being killed because they were skimming profits but that's never been completely confirmed.

A few years ago there was heavy discussion about taking out John Gotti, Jr. A lot of guys were unhappy with him and as you know, he was suspected of having shared valuable information with the feds. Now if anyone is gonna draw heat, it's John Gotti, Jr. They of course haven't gone forward with it, but the tapes don't lie. You hear Sonny Franzese himself giving his blessing. Now I wonder how many people here know who Peter Caporino is. Peter Caporino, a guy who refused any protection from the feds and goes right back to his old hangouts...supposedly. Now who are you gonna blame if he gets clipped? You can't blame the feds. They're gonna turn up the heat because he already testified? That is a ridiculous assumption. You do know he could be called to testify again? They always turn up the heat when a guy is murdered. Especially if it's a high profile target and yet they went after Sammy The Bull. They missed him by a c**t hair.