Thomas Bilotti was a New York mobster with the Gambino crime family who served as underboss for just two weeks. It was this promotion that helped trigger the 1985 assassination of Gambino boss Paul Castellano by John Gotti and Sammy "the Bull" Gravano.

http://youtu.be/TnzPS1ikBy8?list=PLQhDH_WZbs1N0jqZ9y9naMtgUfZ3VoVbo

Great job. That was a nice treat.

There is so much focus on the beef between Castellano and the Bergin crew concerning the tape recordings Paul wanted that little attention is given to the resentment likely generated by Bilotti's promotion.

There had to be resentment. Carlo had two underbosses (Paul and Neil) helping him run one family comprised of two wings. The blue collar wing was loyal to their underboss (Neil), and as sort of a separate family in their own right they probably had their own ideas about who amongst them should be Neil's successor. Whoever they had in mind as the heir apparent probably was not chosen by Paul Castellano.

My next question to this forum is...

Was Thomas Billoti originally a member of the white collar faction or the blue collar faction?


Edit: It looks like Bilotti was connected to the white collar wing which Castellano was Underboss over. Anyone feel free to correct if that is incorrect. If that's true, that was another mistake Castellano made. He should have chosen someone from the blue collar wing of the Gambinos to run that side of the family. Castellano probably should have chosen a successor for himself, a guy to run the white collar side. Big Paul had every right to have two underbosses just like Carlo did. Because he didn't, he lost control.

I had read somewhere that Bilotti wasn't very bright, so if true would he be capable of handling white collar crime ??

Good point. If Bilotti was hired from the white collar side and couldn't run it, that means he would have been the wrong choice for white collar underboss had Paul hired two underbosses to run each wing the way Carlo did.

alpha.. according to everything ive read, castellano just wasn't paying enough attention to the gotti faction. he took the money, but, he was in the dark about most of gottis operations.
he could never relate to " street guys" and his inattention to
the gotti crew was his undoing.

Two underbosses? How does that work? I think Neil was the underboss and Paul was his main capo, sort of... as well as his brother-in-law (and cousin) which gave him a of unique role... but Neil was always the underboss.
Two underbosses theoretically wouldn't really work that well I think especially if they're divided by blue/white collar rackets. There would be rivalry and the white-collar underboss would always bring in more cash.
Then when it comes time for a successor there would definitely be war.. and lets be honest, how many bosses have actually named their successors like Carlo did?

Once Dellacroce died, who SHOULD have been the rightful successor ?

I am sure that Gotti believed he should have been BUT, was proper protocol for all the capos to vote for the underboss OR the boss appoints them?

Clearly the Boss always picks his underboss traditionally, but it's always wise to consider the internal politics of a family before doing so.

Castellano would probably have been best advised to pick someone at least acceptable to the blue collar wing to avoid conflict.

In fact that's exactly why Gambino appointed Dellacroce when Biondo was removed.

In my opinion, the best guy to bridge that gap would have been Jimmy Brown. He was in his sixties at the time, so he was the right age. He had the paper association and the union. He had a brilliant business mind (contrary to popular opinion, there aren't too many dummies running large, successful carting companies). And he could be absolutely lethal when need be. He was the perfect balance between "blue collar" and "white collar." That's why I always believed that had Gigante succeeded in killing Gotti, he would have backed Jimmy for boss.

Look at how Carlo did it. He held court and had two Underbosses keeping an eye on everyone. So that is three people watching everyone. Paul was holed up in his mansion/bunker and lost touch. He probably didn't see the new alignments taking place. The Gambinos started to coalesce around the Gottis and Paul probably had no idea. At least Gotti held court out in the open with the troops, had his ear to the ground, and had all of his brothers and allies spying for him and reporting back.

Greetings Malandrino. From what I always understood, Carlo Gambino had two Underbosses working for him, Neil and Paul. That makes three "street bosses", two of whom who were very closely related by blood. When I say street boss, I mean a hands on boss, not a front boss.

The way to appease the blue collar wing would have been to pick the most popular blue collar capo as Underboss. That's what Paul did in having Neil as his underboss. But once Neil was out of the picture, Paul abandoned that formula for what I do not know. Paul could have called Gotti (or Jimmy Brown as PB suggested) aside and made a deal with him to make Gotti Underboss, and then promise Gotti no retaliation if he turned over the tapes. Then Gotti would've run the blue collars and Paul would've whacked Quack Quack.

I think Underboss is appointed while Consigliere is elected.

Underboss is appointed by the Boss of the family, Consigliere is elected by the Capos. This two underbosses gets confusing to a lot of people. Dellacroce was the official Underboss to the Gambinos. Castellano was the acting boss for the family due to Gambino being in poor health, and Neil was in prison at the time.

Paul was going to name Tommy Gambino boss of the family and Tommy Bilotti underboss for the family. Bilotti was not the sharpest tool in the shed, but he was loyal to Castellano and Paul felt that Tommy needed the help from Bilotti who was a street guy growing up, while Gambino was more like Bill Bonanno, minus the arrogance

and Daniel Marino as underboss

No doubt.

Maybe you guys are right. I don't know. Maybe Carlo had only one Underboss and Paul was acting Boss. But having two Underbosses is not unheard of, according to the following conversation...

" I believe Dellacroce was the underboss to Gambino and then to
Castellano, and Castellano was a skipper who moved up to boss upon Gambino's death. Usually there is only one underboss at a time. In New York that's the case. One exception is during Vito Genovese's incarceration Tommy Eboli was the underboss for New York and Jerry Catena for New Jersey. The New Jersey crime family had a boss for New Jersey and another for Connecticut. New England had two underbosses too, one in Providence and the other in Boston (during the Patriarca period).

Rick"

From:

Two Underbosses in Cosa Nostra

This is the first I have ever heard of Tommy Gambino being groomed for boss position. He was not made under his father Carlo, but only later by Paul. Could you please elaborate? How could Tommy not be part of the family until relatively late in life, and yet at the same time be groomed to be boss?

I remember hearing that Bilotti made some guy suck him off because he owed him money or something. Does anybody know of this story and is it true?

Agreed, if Castellano had a little more political acumen he would have kept Gotti sweet and offered him a top spot, if only until he could have safely taken him out. "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Always grudgingly admired the way that Profaci cleverly neutered the Gallo's by winning over their support base, such as the Persico's.

Or alternatively Castellano could have appointed James Failla as PB said.

GOTTI was not going be second to no one... paul knew john was a problem for years , most everyone knew john would be boss or try to be.. the surprise was john killed him knowing paul was going to prison.. deccio, john et. al. could have made a non violent coup after paul was convicted.. went to the commish, presented the captains case to them and paul would have been taken down, paul did not have the support of any of the worker crews in the family..he may have thought he did .paul was neutralized..fialla and marino were doing nothing if it went that way.. and forget this zip loyalty to paul..john gambino was a major drug dealer ,with gotti's crew already up to their necks in the drug biz..john gambino would have a permit.. johns ego needed to slaughter paul and tommy..make a huge historic splash..bigger that A.A. getting killed in a barber chair.. john never followed cosa nostra, he only talked it on tape. frank deccio made it all possible..without frank john can not get away with it without a war..frank knew he would die for it...and he did

Do you think that John would not let frank be bos after paul?how come nobody thought of Frank being boss?He had more power than John,no?

excellent post bronx

more respect as a logical street thinker, frank was a humble guy when he needed to be..less likely to kill, last resort punishment guy

thank you, it will come with controversy , which is what everyone is entitled to..i keep an open mind.

Joe N Gallo would've made for a good boss imo. He was a contender when Anastasia got hit.

most important frank knew he should be boss, he knew john was going to be a megalomaniac..guys in other families wanted frank not just the gambino guys. these things were not spoken aloud..does anyone here think john was really upset frank got killed??? worried about himself knowing he will be next, but look what happened, not one guy was killed for a vendetta..not one..john knew it was chin.....nobody else could pull it off..

what u think would happend if paul or somebody killed johne pre commision trials?

dellacroce was alive, he would have no choice to support angelo, genie et. al.. but who was going to kill him? billotti and his crew were the only ones paul could trust..

gallo was a brain in that life..you are correct.he wanted no part of it at that point in his life..his family comes from the same town as casio ferro. real school cosa nostra..

Yh didn't he have a heart attack not long after he was made Consig by Carlo?