Rooster, Nicky won't totally accept that Brian Cohen was on record with Sonny or the Buffalo mob, mainly Sonny were partners with the Lucchese family. He is not completely ruling that out, but he demands proof. So I recommend to just drop it, as we have both said what we had to say on that.
On local 91 Michael Quarcini, Mark Congi, Dominick Dellacio, Albert Celeste, Andy Shomers, Salvatore Spatorico, and Anthony Cerrone are all associates to the Buffalo crime family. Dellacio and Quarcini are two of Niagara Falls top associates.
You are right about that--and the Mayor of Lockport at that time (Tucker)--did all he could to help Dellacio form Lockport do less time.
The articles about this local 91 case never connect them to the mafia in WNY, but suggest they are associates and that we call them "wannabes" and "draw our own conclusions" about their connection to the mob. Here is the quote:
Quote
Unlike the International's takeover of Laborers Local 210 in Buffalo, the four-year investigation of Local 91 found not a union infiltrated by the Mafia, but something of a mob unto itself.
"Clearly, the organization of Local 91 is the criminal enterprise here," said Peter Ahearn, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Buffalo office. "Whether they were 'wanna-bes' in terms of how they did business, you can draw your own conclusions."
This article was written back when the mob was still around, although definitely on its last legs. So it's not a stretch to say these guys were wannabes.
Originally Posted by NickleCity
Originally Posted by NickyfromTampa
Second question: What evidence do you have that Local 210 and Local 91 are still mobbed-up? You claimed that the union was never cleaned up fully cleaned up, but there is no evidence of that other than Ron Fino (who flipped in 1989) saying that the feds could have done more in terms of union control. - You haven't got anything which suggests the unions are still mobbed up, and you have in fact linked articles that talk about the unions' "former brutal criminal enterprise" pasts. The key word there is "former."
Nicky did you see my articles from the weekly Standard and Washington times that also suggested the LIUNA national and even its Local 210 in Buffalo weren't really cleaned up... It isn't just Fino who suggested it.
I must have missed those ones. I'll look back through the thread.
Originally Posted by NickleCity
Originally Posted by NickyfromTampa
By 1998, the Buffalo mob was "withering" as confirmed by the feds and the Buffalo News, reeling from federal convictions. http://buffalonews.com/1998/01/31/t...ned-values-and-falling-behind-the-times/ The family's last bust was in 2002, of Sonny Nicoletti Jr. Frank BiFulco was convicted in 2003 of arson as well.
Nicky do you really believe either of the Todaro's had gone completely legit well before 1998, and "shunned any contact with [their] former life" at that time?
Joe Todaro Sr. had been semi-retired since the late 80s and living in Florida most of the time. I doubt Joe Todaro Jr. completely shunned his former life, but I believe that he made more money with his rapidly-growing pizza business than with the remnants of the Todaro mob. By this point his union control had completely gone because his two guys that were running things for him, Gerace and Capitano, were gone. Capitano's sons weren't, but they don't have a single black mark to their name and you can bet that the feds were all over those two sons during the big cleanup that lasted till 2006.
Originally Posted by NickleCity
Originally Posted by NickyfromTampa
Guys like Ciminelli were pretty much forced to do business with the mob in the 80s and 90s. We can't really assume that everything guys like Ciminelli do today is a reflection of their mob connections.
Nicky, Was Ciminelli forced to serve as a trustee for local 210?
He wouldn't have been able to succeed in the industry as much as he did otherwise. The mob ran construction pretty hard back then, and Ciminelli's opportunities wouldn't have blossomed as much as they did without the corrupt role he served. So, in a sense, yes, he was forced to work for the mob or on behalf of the mob to be as successful as he was.
I'll be answering the following part of the thread next.
