What racket does the mob make the most income off of?

Bookmaking

I agree much with your post. But I also think that some posters have forgot about the Chinese tongs and local syndicates in other areas of our country that had/have politicians in their pockets too (except labor/union racketeering, la cosa nostra practically invented/innovated that). On the other notion of structure and code of conduct; 1% percenters, prison orgs, & Chicago street orgs have it too.
Also agree with your comment about the gang signs/colors but they carry themselves more or less like fraternities , but even then it can be hard at time to tell who's a member (strictly speaking Chicago orgs).

They aré a gang but not a street gang. They still have construction and garbage along with many other businesses and unions. Name any legitimate businesses or industries controlled by any other ethnic gang anywhere in the country.

And there-in lies the complete answer to this thread.

That number could be about right if you're taking active members on the street. But the family has approximately 100 or so total members.

Over the past decade, there have been Colombo cases involving the Operating Engineers Union, Concrete Workers Union, and a few others.



I don't think anyone is saying the Italian mob is as strong as it used to be. But it's still very much a force in New York, including in both unions and legitimate businesses. Do your research.



The most recent estimates still put those families at about 200 members each.



His figures were in a little strange in that one because some of them seemed to be inflated, while the Colombos seem low-balled. There were 112 members cited in the 2004 NJ OC report. And 100 or so members have been cited in more recent articles. There's over 90 listed on the forum chart.



Except, for the most part, the Chinese groups' influence didn't extend beyond their own communities. The labor racketeering is what really gave the LCN the clout to effect society in general.

The Latin Kings reported having a beeper store, a dance hall and a pool hall, while the Latin Dragons ran a bakery, a beeper store and a fast-food restuarant.

The Gangster Disciples owned a long list of business enterprises, including clothing stores, grocery stores, jewelry stores, restaurants and an airbrush shop.

The Black Disciples owned businesses as well, according to the recent indictment.

Black Disciple higher-ups Varmah and Varney Voker allegedly used some of their drug profits to buy a nightclub in Atlanta. The Voker twins renamed it Club 2winz and made payments of $20,000 every three weeks in cash until they had paid about $180,000, according to the federal indictment.

Donnell Jehan, the gang's third in command, also played entrepreneur, forming D.B.T. Construction Inc. in 1999. The initials stood for Distinguished Black Tradesmen.

Likewise, Black Disciple leader Marvel Thompson, who held the title "king," was interested in the construction business, incorporating Royal Improvement Ltd. in 1993. (Royal Improvement and D.B.T. Construction were involuntarily dissolved by the state in 2002.)

Thompson also owned a rap record label and a recording studio known as M.O.B. Records Inc. The studio in Englewood produced a hit song, the "Cha Cha Slide," which was performed by Chicago deejay Mr. C.

Ald. Arenda Troutman (20th), who was questioned by investigators after a Chicago police envelope addressed to her was found in the home of a Black Disciple, said she thought she was dealing with legitimate businessmen.

"They talked like businessmen. They were dressed like businessmen. They had business to discuss," she told reporters.

The "unorganized black guy" on the corner slinging rocks more time than not work for some very organized Black guys. Since the old time Black policy/numbers racketeers there has and is been very organized Black crime syndicates. Black gangs in several cites around the country have pushed out or forced Italian mafia to work with them on equal terms there are many Black associate partners within Italian organized crime. So what you see on the corner is a mere scratch on the surface

Jeezus proofread.

First half illegible.

black gangs are not organized like the mafia, they are by far more disorganized except maybe the nigerians in africa

This has to do with the close proximity of Nigeria to Sicily. They do business like the sicilians do and lately involved in human trafficking.

Carmela, Nigeria is quite far away from Sicily. The nigerian syndicates have been applying the trading routes techniques to their networks when they expanded worldwide.

M2w, it's been proven that certain black gangs have organizational structure equal (more/less) to the mafia.

Not far enough by the way the migrants have been flooding into Lampedusa by the boatloads daily, along with the somalians.

Nice one, you got me for a second.

Jokes aside, I believe that nigerians have been involved in human trafficking for a while now. They do not cover the "trip" to Lampedusa tho, that's handled by tunisian/libyan groups.

As for the gang thing, I do believe that the term could fit them, but society does give a different weight to each "label".

To me a gang stops being a gang and becomes a mob when members and profits increase and the overall organization gets layered and better structured. Plus their activities get diversified as well.

I have my moments.

While clearly diminished from its peak, I think it's fair to say that the American LCN is still high up there in terms of organized crime. Still, just because it does its fair share of white collar crime, the families still do plenty of street crime -- burglaries, drugs, etc. To me, all that really separates the Five Families from, say, the Bloods and the Crips is that the Five Families have had the network connections to get plugged into more advanced forms of crime. You're more likely to meet up with corrupt business owners, politicians, trade union officials, contractors, etc. in a white middle-income community than an extremely impoverished African-American community. Of course, as BlackFamily indicated, it is certainly not unheard of for the leaders of black street gangs to integrate themselves into the legit business world, even if it is just to set up fronts.

Still, considering the number of turncoats, attention from the government, and just plain violence the USA LCN has had to deal with, it's amazing to me that the Five Families continue to exist at all. "Omertà" no longer seems to exist (to the extent it ever really existed) and even if a connected or made guy doesn't already have an incentive to flip to avoid jail time, a trigger-happy boss or underboss or even capo is another reason to abandon organized crime.

Why do people still get into it? They just fall in with a bad crowd growing up? Or are they still lured from the false prestige and tradition that surrounds Mafiosi? Or some combination of the two?

I'm also curious as to whether the Genovese family is still the "biggest and baddest" of the Five Families and how much of that is owed to avoiding the problems the other families have faced (not as many turncoats, no bloodthirsty leaders like in the Lucchese). Or is the "Ivy League" reputation still valid, in that Genovese Mafiosi are genuinely smarter than your average thug?

the Geneveses are reported to have around 200 made guys so that puts them right around the size of the gambinos, maybe just a little bigger. To me why the Geneveses are still the strongest goes back to after the 1985 commission trial, The Lucheses went from Corrallo to the "bloodthirsty" Vic and Gas, The Gambinos went from big Paul to Gotti, the colombos had Persico clinging onto power from prison which caused a war causing numerous people to flip and many many more to get arrested, The bonnanos thrived for a while under Massino until the feds started to close in on them and everyone started to flip. All four of those families are just now starting to stabilize from those reigns while the Geneveses have been thriving all along cause Gigante avoided being charged in the case and remained on the street installing secrecy and discipline in the families ranks that still exist today through guys like Bellomo, Cirillo, muscarella, Dentico and many others, i mean theyve only had like 6 made guys flip and 3 of them were from the springfield mass crew.

Rudy Guiliani actually said it best. These mob docu's always say "We ended the mafia". Some retired DA taking credit for "putting EVERYONE away". Guiliani said once, "We turned the MOST POWERFUL organized crime group in America into JUST ANOTHER organized crime group in America."

^Realistic statement without over doing it.

That's true, Dellacroce. But it goes back a lot further than that.

They've always been the most disciplined and low key. I mean, of the New York families the Westside is the organization that most closely resembled the Chicago Outfit at its peak. And by that I just mean that they always stressed getting into legitimate businesses for cover, joining country clubs, and fraternizing with the upper class.

Frank Costello got a lot of press for being obsessed with blending in with a better class of people, but it wasn't just him. All of the Genovese captains that he made had the same mindset. Here it is three generations later and their families are still spending what I always refer to as generational wealth. You can't say that about a lot of wiseguys. I've known of modern day skippers who left their kids broke .

Also, the Westside was the first family to see the benefit of the plea deal. Gotti would kill you for making a deal, the Westside will kill you for NOT making a deal .

One more thing: They have been a little bit lucky as well. You can't discount that luck and chalk up everything to them being the smartest.

To bad Jimmy IDa Didnt feel that way, the guy wouldve been out by now instead of doing life, the guy must be kicking him self every day over it. But yes hes definatly the exception. Ya it seems the Gambinos still havent gotten into the plea deals, shown most recently with Bobby Glasses, guy gets offered 12 years for a double murder rap, he turns it down so now hes gonna die in prison(most likely).

Yeah, in hindsight Jimmy had a pretty sweet deal offered to him. But he decided to roll the dice, and that's that. I'll tell you this much: That guy is a man, and he's not crying about it .

But the guys who REALLY have an ax to grind are Gene Gotti and John Carneglia. They would have been home YEARS ago if not for John's refusal to let them plea out. But John was thick like that. He wouldn't even let Joe Armone come home for one last Chrismas by admitting that he was a Gambino. In hindsight, what harm would it have done?

I doubt anything did more harm than Gotti himself, "I John Gotti, will severe your mother fu**ing head off", haha seems the guy really liked to hear himself talk. i read one of the US attorneys during that time gave Gotti credit for almost every Gambino guy brought down during Gottis reign because of the way everything was done so out in the open. Now im sure thats just some typical prosecuter banter, buts its probably true to a certain extent.

In the WSJ article I posted in the restaurant thread they talk about how Gotti avoided "walk talks" in the winter because it was too cold. Really? You make yourself out to be some hard-ass man's man mafioso and you'd rather be warm and bugged than cold and discreet?

I think the still existing differences between the Mob and other (original american!) crime groups are summed up good by this wikipedia-entry.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gus_Curcio

Yeah, one thing that sets the LCN (particularly the 5 NY families) apart from most other groups is it's longevity. These are organizations that have been running for nearly a century. The Italians had that culture and tradition that kept it going long after the Irish and Jewish mobs were history. Over the past 30 or 40 years, attrition has taken it's toll and, as a result, many of the LCN families are gone or nearly so. But the NY families won't be going anywhere anytime soon. Not only have they been able to maintain their relative membership count in recent times, they are still very diversified. And that diversification is another thing that sets them apart from many other groups. And one of the reasons the Genovese family is still the strongest.



Agreed. That's a very good way to put it.

Another good quote from Giuliani, that hits on this very topic is below...

"If we take back the labor unions, the legitimate businesses, eventually they become just another street gang. Spiritually, psychologically, they've always been just a street gang."

that pretty much sums it up

FUCK THAT.

Whoever here doesnt think the mafia is a gang is simply, kidding themselves.

You draw a distinction between a black or mexican gang slinging crack on street corners, but the 'Ndrangheta or Camorra is NOT A GANG?

DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE 'Ndrangheta and Camorra DO?!?!? Ship fucking coke to the US!

So then I guess its about quantity? A gram is a gang, a kilo is OC?

BULL-SHIT. They are all members of a fraternity which is structed, organised and sells fucking coke.

Nit-picking about quantity is a bullshit excuse. Sell a gram and you're a hood, a kilo and youre a busnisman?

Youre a criminal, gangster, lowlife. The details are fucking semantics.

Yeah maybe drunk. But grow up.

I think you can make a distinction between highly disciplined and organized Mafia groups (not just LCN, but also the Yakuza, Russian Mafiya, the Mexican drug cartels, etc.) and far less disciplined street gangs, and it doesn't just have to be about scale. I am not a sociologist or a criminalogist so there might be an academic threshold I am not aware of, but to me what separates something like the LCN or Yakuza from your typical youth gang in a neighborhood is that the former have very clear hierarchies, strict internal processes for handling matters major to mundane and are capable (and not just willing) of handling more "advanced" forms of crime. The Fruit Town Pirus in Compton, CA may be more than willing to transport heroin from Southeast Asia and then market it wholesale, but they don't have the knowledge, means or connection to do that. They end up on the distribution side of things.

It's interesting you mention the 'Ndrangheta and Camorra because, based on what I've read about them, even though they are engaged in drug trafficking there is also a lot about them that resembles the undisciplined, much more overtly violent neighborhood gangs I mentioned above. In the US, while the LCN may have started out as being very community-oriented and centered around family networks, it's obviously gone much more underground and, as IvyLeague said, has diversified. With the 'Ndrangheta and Camorra, seeing as they have their roots as regional support groups due to a state that either neglected or antagonized them, they are much more open and a fixture in certain parts of southern Italy. They exist both as the shadowy mob we know here in the USA as well as the more obvious thugs walking around with guns, looking menacing. You watch something like Gomorrah and the posturing the kids do to imitate the Camorra, it's much more like how many kids in the USA imitate in appearance and in petty crime the gangbangers they've come to idolize in popular culture. And those gangbangers in turn aspire to imitate the higher tier of crime above them, looking up to Lucky Luciano, Al Capone, John Gotti, etc.

I totally agree that we shouldn't glamorize criminals or what they do but to blur all lines for the sake of staking a moral claim that "all lowlifes are the same" seems to be a bit excessive. Academics or even armchair scholars can study something, form categories and draw distinctions without romanticizing what it is they are studying.

The only thing is, with gangs like the camorra, and even cosa nostra, those boys grow up on the streets of naples or in backward provinces of sicily like agrigento, there is no work. So even the mothers groom their sons to be good soldiers and work like their fathers. You're born into your family, which most likely already has mafia ties and connected. So it's either you renounce it and get an education and look for any remedial job, sit on unemployment for years, or are lucky enough to get work, or you stick to your mob ties.
On the streets of those cities, you either eat or you're eaten.
But in the US, there is absolutely no reason for anyone to be involved, or actively try and join mafia.

And they're all part of a gang. Hence the word "gangsters". Some just more organized than others.