I've changed my view on this in recent years, I think the whole front boss thing is a bit of a blind by Law Enforcement. I believe Benny Squint was simply a guy who liked to operate behind the scenes and leave most of the traditional duties of the boss to his underboss, first Tommy Ryan, then Funzi and later, briefly, Fat Tony and because of this the feds were fooled into thinking these guys were the bosses, until Savino put them in the picture in 1981.

I think this is clearly shown when you look at the chart the feds drew up around 1985 showing Lombardo as Boss and, I think, Fat Tony or Chin as underboss. And this is despite convicting Salerno in the commission case. And, of course, by this time Lombardo had retired and left Gigante boss.