Italians and Mexicans Involved In Business Together



Former Los Angeles capo Jimmy Fratianno said he was close to a member of the Mexican Mafia named Adolph "Champ" Reynoso in the 60's and 70's. I've also heard that after Salvatore Marino became a capo of the San Jose crime family in the mid 80's he had some drug dealers involved with a Mexican gang called Varrio Horse Shoe pay him a monthly percentage to operate. Varrio Horse Shoe is a popular Norteno gang in a really poor neighborhood in West San Jose. The neighborhood is next to the Willow Glen area, which is one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the San Jose area and where Marino is from. That went on for about a year until the Nuestra Familia found out, after being told what was happening by the leader of Varrio Horse Shoe, who happened to be connected to the Nuestra Familia and let a few members of the San Jose Regiment of the NF know what was going on and they asked Marino to back off and he did. By that time the San Jose crime family was almost gone with around 16 made members and didn't have enough muscle as the NF did. The NF is one of five Mexican-American organized crime groups operating in the United States. Former Los Angeles crime family capo Mike Rizzi was paying the Mexican Mafia for protection after being sent away for 33 years in the 1980s. He was also close to Mexican Mafia boss Joe Morgan, a white gangster who grew up with Mexicans in East L.A. Robert "Robot" Salas was a Mexican Mafia member who was close friends with a Gambino crime family associate named Jimmy Coppola.




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Italians and Latino's have been doing business together for nearly a century. Italians and Mexican have been doing business with each other since the time of prohibition.

The Story on Marino is true, not only did the Nuestra Family told Salvatore to back off, but the consigliere at the time Guttadauro advised Sal to back off the arrangement. Most of the membership in the family at the time were getting old and had enough money to last them.

When Marino was housed in SQ, he was also paying protection to La Eme. Majority of Italians paid protection to other groups unless the mobster could take care of himself or there was a big group of LCN from different families house in the same prison.

Did Marino pay La Eme for protection in SQ or was it the NF. Remember the Mexican Mafia and Nuestra Family hate each other. It has to do with the whole Norteno and Sureno thing.

SQ has always been dominated by La Eme. Northern California is Nuestra Family turf, while Southern California is La Eme turf. It was like that in the prison system too, until prison officials found out what was going on, then they had members of the NF transferred to the southern prisons, and LE transferred to the northern prisons. It was an attempt to break up the gangs on the street to not allow them a strong leader to look up to, but the California authorities were wrong, it lead to many prison attacks for a long while.

Very interesting. Did you ever hear about the gladiator fights that the prison guards in Corcoran Prison were busted for?

Yes, the rumor is if the correction officer that had reported it had not done so, some of the inmates were going to kill the four guards that they believe were responsible for the gladiator fights. Keep in mind this was going to be a joint attack where race did not play a factor.

Mexican Mafia no longer has active beef with Nuestra Familia. Surenos vs Nortenos, though, it's a different story.

Also, I posted this picture on another thread:

Why would Mafia members pay protection money to Mexicans instead of the Aryan Brotherhood? They're the same race and are as tough as any prison gang.

Robert "Robot" Salas, his brother is a member of the Mongols Motorcycle Club

Ted, although they're the same race as you call it. I myself don't consider Italian Americans white. The white people are Anglo Americans or people of Northern European descent. Mexicans and Italians have a lot of similarities.

Maniaco, are you sure about them not beefing anymore? Those two are rivals and pretty much would always be rivals.

Nice pic. Robot is on our right.

All 5 Mexican Mob Groups In The US

* La Eme
* Nuestra Familia
* Texas Syndicate
* Barrio Azteca
* Mexikanemi

It's because Mexican Mafia was and still partially is the dominant organization in San Quentin, therefore they were able to give better protection than AB. Also, as stern49 had said, majority of Italian-Americans don't think of themselves as equal whites with average white prisoner in USA.



Yeah, if my memory serves me right his brother was either one of the starting members or a very influential member. I'm pretty sure he was the president at one point. Some family, huh? Robert was also one of most influential carnales in his days. He was one of those carnales who looked outside of the box. He wanted to be more sophisticated and he behaved accordingly.



Well, I remember reading somewhere that Mexican Mafia stopped the war with Nuestra Familia. By that, it doesn't mean they're not rivals. It's just that when members of the two factions face each other, they don't automatically take out shanks and go hunt for blood. But Surenos and Nortenos still go at it hard(in the areas that they meet of course. Those would include Northern part of California where Nortenos are majority, but there's some Sureno sets there. However, there's maybe, IF a set or two of Nortenos in So Cal. Surenos in So Cal are too busy beefing each other).

Also, out of the five Mexican-American prison organizations, only two are active in California. Maybe you should've also mentioned New EME. It's an organization in Arizona that started off of original, Californian EMEROS starting EME in Arizona prison system but then the new school vs old school beef started. However, in late 90s/early 2000s the two factions got together because they realized they can, in some cases, quadruple their money. Just another example that money rules the world.

Thanks Maniaco. Yeah, in California prisons the Italians either roll with the Chicanos or the peckerwoods. Merry Christmas to you and your family bro.

I heard about Arizona's Mexican Mafia, but it's the same organization just another chapter I heard.

Thanks, all of the best to you too!

As for Arizona EME, originally it was another chapter and the carnales who were made in Arizona were accepted as carnales in California too. However, when all the original, Californian EMEROS got SHU'd up, younger guys broke their ties to them and started acting on their own, thus creating New EME(as it was called). As I mentioned, though, the war stopped so both sides can make money.

It depends. Look at how Paul Castellano and most of the NY mobsters thought about Hispanics. Then you also had plenty of Hispanics who worked with the mob. I don't think the Italian gangsters think they're the same as the Hispanics. Italians are closer to Caucasians than they are to Mestizos.

The reason the California mobsters were closer to the Hispanics is because the AB didn't become a force until much later than the Mexican prison gangs. The choice was between aligning with the blacks or the Mexicans.

Good points. And even if Mexican and Italian culture is similar, Italian Americans would definitely have more in common with Caucasians than Mexicans/Mexican Americans.

Actually the AB was much more of a force during those times Coppola and those guys were teaming up with eme cause most of the leaders were not put in the SHU or 24 hour lockdown yet. Although they are still a force amongst prison gangs sticking a lot of the leaders in solitary seriously curtailed them enough to allow other groups such as the nazi low riders, pen1 and dirty white boys to become prominent.

Italian-Amercians identify with Caucasians more, but I believe that an Italian from southern Italy would have more in common with a mexican than some 4-5th generation Italian-American you grew up in the burbs and is playing gangster. As its been said
so many times before these guys look at the $ differently than we do its about power and respect to them, not to mention both groups have been shown to be ruthless.

One of the first big connections between the italian/jewish mob and the mexican's was somewhere around late 30's or early 40's.Story goes that Meyer Lansky,Benjamin Siegel,Moe Dalitz and Harry Tietlebaum with the help of the Los Angeles crime family,worked on expanding drug trafficking operations in Mexico and also finding other alternative routes.A lucrative heroin network had been established from drug traffickers based in Mexico City,from Los Angeles to major cities across the United States including New York,Philadelphia and Miami.They were dealing with Enrique Diarte,a Tijuana based Mexican narcotics trafficker.But back in thouse days Mexico had been producing lowgrade heroin for a number of years,they had never been able to produce the fine white powder demanded by the addicts.

To be more precise, those are Mexican prison gangs and there's a lot more than just those five, though they are among the five biggest. You've got Tango Blast, Hermanos de Pistoleros Latinos, Border Brothers, and so on.

Hi Ivy, thanks for your post. These are actually the only 5 organized crime crews that are Mexican-American. Those you listed are actually gangs, especially the Border Brothers who started in Oakland and are rivals with the Nortenos. Very vicious gangs yet still gangs.

This is where we get into the often murky distinction between organized crime and gangs. A group like La Eme is first and foremost a prison gang. Yes, their influence extends to the streets of Southern California but so do that of many other prison gangs. A Mexican prison gang not among those five you listed could just as easily be charged with a RICO conspiracy as La Eme, Nuestra Familia, etc. So I'm not sure what makes those particular five "organized crime" while the others aren't.

Check out the link below. You will see Barrio Azteca, La Eme, Mexikamemi, Nuestra Familia, and the Texas Syndicate all listed as prison gangs.

http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ocgs/gangs/prison.html

I agree with you to a point. Some of the older gang members in the gangs you listed I'm sure dabble in OC, but these ones are most likely connected to La Eme and the other 4 that I mentioned, the veteranos I guess you can say, which means older gang members in Spanish.

Those ones I've listed started off as prison gangs and evolved into organized crime groups later on, like La Eme that originally were a gang of young thugs. They're involved in OC in prison and on the outside.

It's definitely people of Southern Italian ancestry that feel they have a lot of stuff in common with Hispanics. I've actually met one American of full Southern Italian descent that rolled with the Nortenos. He even considered himself one. He quit banging, though. Also, there's a high ranking member of the mob in NY with the last name of Campos who is half Puerto Rican, so I don't think all Italian mobsters are racist towards Hispanic people.

All of the guys that started EME were considered as 'veteranos' in their neighborhoods and they had a lot of 'palabra' or 'juice', aka power in it. Otherwise they wouldn't be in it. La EME doesn't really recruit(and never truly had recruited) young thugs. Maybe for petty jobs, but definitely not to be a part of the organization.

Actually they were pretty young when starting La Eme. Here is a pic of them around the time they started at the Deuel Vocational Institution, a California Youth Authority facility which is now an adult state prison in Tracy, California.

They were young, but not that young. In those days even older men went to Youth facilities, based on how serious their crime was. Also, on the picture you posted they all look older than 22-23. Wouldn't really call them that young based on the fact that most people join gangs between age 8-12.