http://www.meesonfamily.com/obituary?id=1365181

I think this is what you meant to post. Rene died last night. I will be attending the service, so I will try to get some pictures.

Hey I know this thread is about Rochester but I just looked on the Buffalo family Wikipedia page and someone edited it saying Lenny Falzone stepped down and Anthony Todaro, the son of Joe Todaro Jr is now boss. Anyone else want to call bullshit because I am

I agree Joe. Wikipedia is a freakin free for all. I once knew a guy in Rochester who edited the Wikipedia page for the Rochester Crime Family, and put his name as the current boss lol. Lenny Falzone is really old though. None of the Todaros are involved in organized crime, even Joe Jr. Why would they get involved with all their money?

I like you, Gingello, and I don't want to see you cross the line over to stalker. So please don't take and post any pictures from a wake .

Hey Pizza you are right. Just for the record though, my wife is the niece of someone involved in the life so I am not crashing the wake and funeral. I would not be a stalker technically lol. You are right though it would be in poor taste, and possibly hazard to my health and marriage.

Take some pictures of the meatballs at the reception afterwards or at the after party

What did Stanley Valenti do in the last 22 years, did he manage to use the ill health excuse to avoid trial for so long?


Wasn't he the boss after Valenti was forced to resign? I thought the underboss of the A-team was Gingello and Picarreto the consigliere.

It was all such a jumbled mess and so long ago, you may be right, and I may have the self anointed roles of Russotti and Gingello reversed. It was so pounded into our heads that it was still Buffalo and these guys were all outlaws that we never recognized it anyway. My station at the time was a bit to the East, trying in my limited way to keep all of upstate NY from slipping out of Buffalo's hands

Nearly the entire crew of breakaway Rochester guys were all either made into Buffalo or were Buffalo associates. Yes many of them had Pittsburgh and Buffalino contacts and connections, but they were by all rules and recognized as Buffalo. Rochester was never recognized either by Buffalo or the commission as a separate family. They COULD have been had they gone to Buffalo with a business plan instead of an ultimatum, and Pittsburgh, NE Pennsylvania and the Colombos had kept their paws out of it, and a lot of death, misery, prison terms and ruined lives could have been avoided(I could go on for days)
It was the generation before these guys who moved from the city to places like Greece, Brighten and Henrietta, those burbs have had large Italian American populations since the late 50s

Arm

of the buffalo guys that you knew, how were they to deal with ? reasonable, or not.

I was with the Falange crew, and to be honest I was young and I knew most of these guys since I could walk, and since my dad and two Uncles were made I was always treated well and it was easy for me to deal with them
Looking at it objectively,I can honestly say if anything Buffalo guys and the family in general had almost too much integrity and were too reasonable for their own good. Everyone always goty paid, money was always cut and no one on the inside was made a victim
Contrary to what anyone says, when Pops was whacked, we were ready willing and able to retaliate, but at the end of the day, it just didn't make sense to go to war over it.
Other families would have crushed Rochester the second they talked about breaking away,instead, they let them self destruct.
As a young hot headed kid, I WANTED to take the war to the Colombos back yard. My thoughts after they whacked Marrone were hit a few people in Brooklyn and watch them call the troops home. Cooler heads prevailed and again, we just held our ground and eventually they beat themselves. A lot of my old friends are dead or incarcerated, and they were, as Mobsters go, great people to deal with.

arm

about 10 years ago i heard the todaro's were credited with reuniting upstate new york back under the buffalo flag. any comments about this ?

I sure can...first hand
It actually started under Frangiamore and Pops, but it was Todaro who put the pieces back together.
AS I have often said, the ABC wars were not confined to Rochester.It went on from Ohio to New England and from the Adirondacks to Pennsylvania.Everyone thought they could grab a chunk of real estate becuse the perception was Buffalo was on the ropes. In Easten upsate NY, it was the Colombo's and Buffalinos.
Frangiamore went to the commission and Tony Ducks said, and I quote,"I don't give a shut who runs those cow towns"
The attitude of the crews in Upstate NY was that we were rather die a miserable death than have to answer and kick up to scumbags like D'Ela and Persico, so we went to the mattresses and stood our ground.
In the end we won but it cost some of us our lives and a lot of us our freedom, some for longer than others.
By the early 90s it was over but the leadership structure was in shables. It was Tadoro that came in and sorted it all out.
I have known the current skipper from central NY since we were kids, and Russ is a stand up guy, but all due respect, he is NOT his dad. Benny Carcone was a superstar, may he rest in peace

arm

why was johhny pops so important in this ?

Pops was closely tied to the old school Upsate NY guys. He and Falcone, The Terzini's,Louri,Andaloro and Bruno went all the way back to the pre LCN days.
Frangiamore and Pieri knew he knew the landscape and politics, so he was the link between Falange and the Bosses

Hey Arm have you heard about the Buffalo Family still shaking down some of the strip clubs in Western NY, specifically Buffalo, Niagara Falls and possibly Rochester? I can PM you if you do not want to discuss it on the open forum. I know first hand they are involved in Buffalo, not sure about The Falls and Rochester though.

My main contacts with Buffalo these days are in Ontario and Utica, but yes I have heard this is the case. The entire adult industry has become a prime LCN earning business everywhere and Buffalo is no exception.Most of what I hear about the falls revolves around the legal casino gambling business, but there is a direct connection between the two.
But Yeah..PM me with some specifics if you like

havent heard anything about that here in the falls. but i wouldnt dismiss it as probable.

U guys are so quick to play the who knows this guy game that u don't realize you are snitching

Who's snitching?
The names I mentioned on this tread, are public knowledge,or the names of the dead
If you can put something together based on the cryptic way I go into things, the are the best detective since Dick Tracy

I have not posted any information that is not already known to local and federal authorities. the people I have posted about even know that I have posted about them. I do not name specific crimes just generalizations. If that makes me a rat then whatever. I am not in the mafia and I never claimed to be.

I was told during one of my "time outs" by someone in a position to know that this site is EXTREMELY careful, and that specifics and "true" facts are not their chosen material, they tend to favor news accounts and the like.
I respect that, and that is all anyone had to say...so I am being even more careful

this is snitching...i dont care how you spin it

go take a picture of a funeral you weirdo

Cheech...where do you live?
The reeason I ask is, I have mainly lived in Brooklyn, Providence,Utica NY and Chicago.
In any of those places, any person with any type of street smarts who can connect dots and put 2+2 togeher can walk or drive down certain streets and know in about 5 minutes a lot of what is happening.
Those are the limits of what I discuss.
No names of the free or living
No reference to any crime committed by anyone alive or not incarserated.
I do NOT have a dog in the NY vs Outfit pissing contests, but I will say that if anyone in the "28 members" in Chicago or "Rockford is extinct" camp, come visit either city sometime and take the pulse, I asure you it would give them a new outlook.

im from new haven, whole life...

just because we both know the score doesnt mean we have to say we know the score...get what im sayin?

With that "no snitching" speeches you will make the forum boring. Soon we will be talking like:
"the unspecified individual n.1 committed an unspecified crime against the unspecified individual n.2 at ??.?? ??.??.??"

Touche'

its an open forum, there are ways of saying things...i get your point though.

so what if i say the following

the strip clubs in new haven all kick up to the ny guys...
is it common knowledge? maybe...but who am i to say

and a problem i have is used my real nickname like a moron

Or worse

You say that in jest, but there are some who would like to see that, and that any names mentioned should be filtered through the FBI misinformationj echo chamber (I don't include Cheech in that)

I wasn't being too serious.
I understand there are misinformation cases, it's just I am often annoyed in how the newspapers don't go into details, so it's not clear at all what is going on. However, I agree that being too quick in calling names may create embarrassing situations: in the 90s there was an accountant in Milan who got arrested just because he had the same name and surname of a mafia boss.

But why did you say "or worse": the 2 quotes are identical, one statement can't be worse than the other.