The LaFatas: From the Black Hand to Aerial Narcotics
- Matteo Galante
- Apr 25
- 24 min read
Updated: Apr 28
The Sicilian Mafia had established some form of presence in the San Francisco Bay Area as early as 1875. While the “Black Hand” was a method of extortion practiced not only by Italians, it was common among early mafiosi. The first major Black Hand incident to cause a public stir in San Francisco was the murder of Sicilian laborer Biaggio Vilardo in 1905. Vilardo had been assisting police in identifying the killers of his friend, Giuseppe “Fisherman Joe” Brogardo, who was attacked and shot by four other fishermen during a party at a North Beach barber shop.
Brogardo was a former tenant at the Montgomery Street property of fish dealer Filippo Fertitta, one of the alleged mafiosi suspected of slaying New Orleans Police Chief David Hennessy in 1890. Nine years later, in San Francisco, Fertitta stabbed his fiancée’s cousin, Joseph Sierro, to death with a carving knife. Police traced Fertitta to Baker Beach, then arrested him a week later in a vegetable garden near the Cliff House. The jury believed his story of self-defense and he was acquitted.
Filippo Fertitta & Joseph Sierro
While Biaggio Vilardo was secretly working with police to find Brogardo’s killers, he was threatened by a fisherman who said his friends would cut his head off if he didn’t stop his pursuit. On the night of April 5, 1905, a witness saw a man drop a bulky shawl at the corner of Powell and Mason Streets. Wrapped in the shawl was a man’s torso. Shortly after, two boys at Fisherman’s Wharf caught a burlap sack containing two arms, two legs, and a head. The body was reassembled at the morgue, where an estimated 20,000 people showed up to view it before Crispino Vilardo identified it as his brother, Biaggio.
Biaggio & Crispino Vilardo
Biaggio Vilardo was living on Green Street with Pietro Tortorici, another mafioso from New Orleans. When detectives searched their apartment, the walls and ceiling had been re-plastered and re-painted, and the floor had been cleaned, but blood stains still covered the surfaces. Police also found a blood-stained cleaver under the sink. Detectives determined that Vilardo was eating dinner alone at home when he was attacked from behind with the cleaver. His roommate, Pietro Tortorici, had disappeared. Police believed that Tortorici’s wife, Rosa, had knowledge of the killing. They reportedly took her infant, tortured Mrs. Tortorici, and forced her to view Vilardo’s remains until she threw herself on the ground hysterically.
Pietro & Rosa Tortorici, Diagram of the Crime Scene, Rosa Tortorici Handing Over Her Baby
Almost a decade later, Tortorici was arrested for shoplifting in Kansas City. Using the name “James Geffene,” he was released on bail and again disappeared. He went to Tucson before he was arrested again in Seattle in March 1916 using the alias “James Mariano,” while visiting his wife, who was in jail for pickpocketing. Tortorici was returned to San Francisco to face trial. His attorney told him he’d likely be hanged if he admitted his identity, so Tortorici claimed he was James Geffene throughout the trial. The jury could not agree on a verdict and Tortorici was acquitted, but the trial led police to arrest Angelo Napoli for the murder of Giuseppe Brogardo.
Following the deaths of Brogardo and Vilardo, the most prominent of San Francisco’s Black Hand rings was the Pedone-LaFata gang. Like the Pedones, the LaFata brothers - Pietro, Michele, Rosolino, and Salvatore - were also born in Palermo, Sicily. The Pedones and LaFatas were acquaintances before coming to America in the early 1900s. (Read more about the Pedones here.)
Pietro LaFata’s first daughter, Rose, was born in Italy in 1903, followed by Antonietta, born in Albuquerque in 1906. His only son, John, was born in Chicago in 1907. By 1909, Pete was employed as a boilermaker and had moved to Greenwich Street off Columbus Avenue in North Beach. He also kept an address on East 117th Street in Manhattan for at least another year.
Pete LaFata was first arrested for theft in May 1908 after stealing $100 (over $3,000 in 2025) from a woman in San Bernardino County, California. He was convicted of grand larceny and sentenced to one year. In late 1908, his daughter Eveline (Evelyn) was born in San Francisco. After his release, he moved around North Beach, residing on Powell Street, Bannam Place, then Jones Street, and purchased a home in the Stege area of Richmond.
In 1910, Sam LaFata was living on Vallejo Street in San Francisco with Rosie DeLosa, whom he married in March. Their first son, John Peter, was born the same year. Rosie was the daughter of Francesco DeLosa, owner of the Trinacria Hotel, a boarding house, restaurant and saloon on the corner of Broadway and Montgomery Streets that the LaFatas were known to frequent. In 1895, a disagreement between two of DeLosa’s boarders ended in the death of Eugenio DiLeva. Reportedly partners in a window cleaning business, DiLeva and Vincenzo DePalma were heard arguing about money before DePalma shot him twice, beat him in the head with his revolver, then shot him again in front of the Trinacria. DeLosa eventually moved his saloon to Columbus Avenue, where it was burglarized on more than one occasion.
Trinacria Ad & Vincenzo DePalma
At the time of Sam’s marriage, Mike LaFata was living on 106th Street in Manhattan and working as a barber. He would be in San Jose by 1915, when his daughter, Rosa, was born. Rosolino LaFata moved into a house on Filbert Street in North Beach in 1911. He was employed as a bartender, then fish packer, before moving to Broadway and opening his own saloon on Columbus.
In September 1912, using the alias “Samuel Cortesce,” Sam LaFata traveled to Southern California for a friend’s banquet. He was one of fourteen Italian men that attended dinner at 836 Cleveland Street in Los Angeles. After an evening of spaghetti and red wine, the event suddenly came to an end when LaFata and Giuseppe Romano jumped up from their table and began shooting at each other. When the smoke cleared, Romano was pronounced dead. Michael Macchiaroli was hit in the knee. Salvatore LaFata, the suspected killer, was hit twice in the abdomen but had already left the scene.
LaFata checked into the county hospital, where he was treated for his gunshot wounds, including one to his left lung. He escaped from the hospital and, in November, boarded the steamship Yale from Los Angeles to Oakland. Upon arrival at the Pacific Street wharf, police arrested him in a crowded cabin. Identified by his “sharp Italian features,” a scar, and “two festering bullet wounds,” LaFata gave his name as Samuel Cortesce (printed as Cortez), but admitted he was also known as LaFata because he had a half-brother, Pete, in San Francisco. He claimed the shooting was in self-defense and that he was coming to San Francisco to look for work in his trade of plastering. No charges were filed against LaFata.
In 1913, Sam was working as a grocer on Union Street, Rosolino was naturalized in San Francisco, and Pete’s wife, Maria DiMarco, died. Sam’s second and third sons, Frank John and Peter Joseph, were born in 1913 and 1914, respectively. By 1915, dozens of successful Italian immigrants around the Bay Area had reported that they were targeted by the Black Hand. In February 1916, Pete LaFata was arrested as he walked into an insurance office to collect money on his Richmond house that burned down in December. Arrested at the same time was Antonio Pedone, described as one of LaFata’s lieutenants. Both men were suspected of arson and authoring Black Hand letters around Contra Costa County, but were released four months later for lack of evidence.
Pietro LaFata & Antonio Pedone
Around this time, Sam LaFata moved from California to Chicago, then to Brooklyn, where he opened a grocery store. In late 1916, Gaetano Ingrassia was killed in a public shootout with the Pedones in North Beach. With the Pedones imprisoned, it was believed that Rosolino LaFata became the head of the gang. By mid-1917, Sam LaFata moved from Brooklyn to Utica, where he and Giuseppe Aiello operated a saloon together. In June, LaFata and Aiello were arrested on suspicion of shooting Antonio Gagliano, another saloon owner. Gagliano survived and repudiated the charges in court.
Sam LaFata then moved to Buffalo, where he was arrested for vagrancy in August 1917. He was discharged when he proved he was about to open a store in the area. Two months later, he was invited to a meeting at an Italian restaurant owned by Sylvester Amato at 143 East Eagle Street. On the evening of October 7, 1917, LaFata grabbed a loaded revolver and left his home for the meeting. That night, he was shot in the head four times, bullets ripping through his temple and cheeks, knocking out three teeth. Sam LaFata was allegedly killed on orders of Giuseppe DiCarlo, an early leader of Buffalo’s mafia family.
Joe Aiello would move to Chicago, where he eventually became president of the Unione Siciliana and went to war against Al Capone. Aiello, described by the Chicago Tribune as “the toughest gangster in Chicago,” was killed in October 1930, struck by dozens of bullets from multiple submachine guns while entering a taxi.
Giuseppe DiCarlo & Giuseppe Aiello
One year after Gaetano Ingrassia’s death, Mariano Alioto, his son-in-law who testified against the Pedones, was shot and killed by a member of the Pedone-LaFata gang in North Beach. The shooter, Antone Lapara (Antonio Lipari), was sentenced to death. By 1920, Mike LaFata had opened a restaurant in San Jose and worked as a bartender. Rosolino moved from Broadway to 19th Avenue. Pete was naturalized in New York in 1921, then moved to Arguello Boulevard. Rosolino became a large-scale bootlegger, owning vineyards in areas like Lodi (California), while Pete and Mike partnered with Antone “Black Tony” Parmagini in the narcotics business.
Black Tony was one of the most successful racketeers on the Pacific coast during Prohibition, having a hand in all types of criminal enterprises, including rum-running, drugs, prostitution, and gambling. Born in Genoa, Italy, he grew up in North Beach and maintained low-key relationships with high-level underworld figures. He also kept local police and federal agents on his payroll. It was reported that east coast gangsters like Arnold Rothstein, Jack “Legs” Diamond, Irving “Waxey Gordon” Wexler, and Dutch Schultz wouldn’t send product to the west coast unless Black Tony handled it. Parmagini became a millionaire during Prohibition, financing young bootleggers and ex-convicts, and buying a fleet of ships that traveled between San Francisco and Shanghai.
In April 1923, two of Black Tony’s associates were arrested for distributing morphine from a vehicle. George Tyrrell, 18, and Joseph “Joe Mope” (or “Mopey Joe”) Alioto, 19, admitted to running daily routes and earning $50 (over $900) per day, but declined to give the names of their higher-ups. It was reported that they came from respectable families who refused to bail them out. Joe “Mope” Alioto was a cousin of Giuseppe Alioto and his brothers, and later worked as a bartender at Alioto’s cocktail lounge at Fisherman’s Wharf. He was also found to be a local contact of Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel. Alioto and Tyrrell were allegedly the youngest people ever sentenced in federal court to a penitentiary for a violation of the narcotics act.
In July 1923, John LaFata, Pete’s son, was arrested with an associate who was caught selling morphine on the street. LaFata surrendered after being shot at twice. He was released due to lack of evidence. Federal agents began shadowing his uncle Mike, who had been making frequent trips to the neighborhood. They believed he was making deliveries to drug dealers. Two months later, Mike LaFata was arrested in a raid on a Vallejo Street house. Agents seized $4,000 ($72,000) worth of morphine and cocaine, and alleged that LaFata was one of the leaders of the dope ring.
Mike served two years in Leavenworth, but not before his bail was posted by Mimi Imperato, a known bootlegger, opera singer, and owner of the Bohemian Cafe on Union Street. Rosolino paid the bond fee. Imperato had recently been targeted by the Black Hand, and in November 1923, was lured from his cafe by fellow performer Quintilia Martucci. Waiting were three men who kidnapped, robbed, and held him captive in South San Francisco.
Imperato was then beaten and pistol-whipped on the way to the Cliff House, where the men planned to throw him into the Bay. When the San Francisco Police “Shotgun Squad” intervened and cornered the vehicle, the men warned Imperato to keep quiet or the Black Hand would kill him. Arrested with loaded revolvers were Francesco Bruno, John LaRosa, and Pete LaFata. The incident was described as one of the most sensational and dramatic crimes in recent San Francisco history.
Frank Bruno, born in Palermo, was a close associate of the Pedone-LaFata gang and a commercial fisherman with the Western Fish Company and the Alaska Packing Company. He also owned the Bruno Hotel in Pittsburg. In 1910, he was fined for poaching over 500 pounds of striped bass from San Antonio Creek, and in 1915 was accused of shooting a business partner to death over the price of a boat purchase. He was arrested along with 25 others in Contra Costa County for bootlegging in 1919, 1921, and in October 1923, when he was ordered to close his hotel, two weeks before Imperato’s kidnapping. John LaRosa, a recent arrival from New York, fled to Los Angeles. All three were acquitted when Imperato withdrew the charges.
The trio reportedly kidnapped Imperato to make him pay Rosolino back for Mike’s bail bond fee. They then attempted to intimidate Rosolino into providing funds for their defense but were unsuccessful. The men swore to get even. A few nights after the kidnapping, Mary Ciarloni LaFata, Rosolino’s wife, was home alone when their house was burglarized by three men posing as Prohibition agents. They threatened her with a revolver and stole $5,000 ($92,000) in diamonds and twelve cases of whiskey worth $3,000 ($55,000). Rosolino and his family also began receiving death threats.
In early 1924, New Jersey gangster Rocco Russo was summoned to San Francisco to get revenge on Rosolino. Russo, also born in Palermo, had previous arrests for assault and robbery with an automatic revolver, but was granted leniency because he had served as a Private in the United States Army during World War I. On February 27, 1924, Rosolino LaFata left a cafe at Filbert and Powell Streets and approached his vehicle when Russo emerged from the other side and shot him three times. LaFata, hit in the brain, was killed instantly.
Russo was chased for several blocks but escaped through a crowd on Grant Avenue. In LaFata’s pocket was a bank book that showed he deposited money at a rate of $800 to $1,000 ($14,000 to $18,000) a day. Liquor and a pistol were found in his vehicle. Described as a “wealthy Italian,” detectives reported that LaFata was not only a known bootlegger, but a suspect in numerous Black Hand cases. Rosolino’s wife and daughter claimed that his brother, Pete, was his nemesis and that they had a bitter relationship for years. Still, his brothers arranged a $2,000 ($36,000) funeral to “flaunt their colors in the face of the enemy.” LaFata was buried at the Italian Cemetery in Colma, California.
Detectives linked LaFata’s slaying to clues in the murder of Angelo Domenichini just days prior. Last seen alive in the Tosca Cafe on Columbus Avenue, Domenichini was a retired produce merchant known for flashing his diamond jewelry and rolls of money. His body was found in a barley sack at the foot of a cliff near South San Francisco after being robbed, beaten, and strangled with a rope. One hundred years later, Angelo Domenichini’s death is the oldest cold case on file in the Bay Area.
A couple weeks after Rosolino’s death, Pete LaFata’s daughter, Antonietta, died at 19 years old. She was laid to rest alongside her mother, and Rosolino, at the Italian Cemetery. Rocco Russo left San Francisco for Detroit, where he married Clara Thewes on March 26. A few weeks after his marriage, he re-enlisted in the Army. Frank Bruno, then considered one of the biggest dealers of illicit drugs in San Francisco, was arrested again in late 1924 for peddling morphine, and Pete LaFata left the country to visit Italy and France.
In August 1925, Rosolino’s estate was awarded to his father in Italy. When the funeral expenses were charged to the estate, the Public Administrator denied the claim and brought forth a lawsuit for payment. Mary LaFata, believing she was entitled to Rosolino’s estate, also filed a lawsuit. In August 1926, two and a half years after Rosolino’s murder, Rocco Russo was arrested in Brooklyn and brought back to the west coast to face trial.
The next month, Evelyn LaFata, Pete’s daughter, married Philip Gargano in San Francisco. Gargano, a barber from Louisiana, had three arrests for vagrancy before moving to California by 1916. In San Francisco, July 1919, his then-wife, Margaret “Pearl” Evans, stabbed Mrs. May Nelson twice in the face after mistaking her for a woman that spoke to her husband. Nelson withdrew charges when Evans agreed to pay for her medical expenses.
The Garganos then moved to Los Angeles, where they and their nephew, Anthony Marquise, were accused of killing hotel owner William Frank Sheets four months later. Sheets was robbed of $600 ($10,000) and shot in the hallway of his hotel, where Evans was a housekeeper. The stolen money was used to purchase a vehicle that was traced to Santa Barbara, but the Garganos weren’t found until February 1920 in New Orleans. Marquise was found in San Antonio, Texas. By June, all three were acquitted due to solid alibis. Phil Gargano and Pearl Evans divorced in September 1921. Moving back to San Francisco, Gargano partnered in the narcotics business with Black Tony and the LaFatas.
During Rocco Russo’s trial, his mother moved the courtroom by falling to her knees, kissing the judge’s hand, and sharing a photograph of Russo posing with an American flag in his Army uniform. However, in January 1927, he was found guilty of murder in the first degree and sentenced to life in prison. While Russo was in San Francisco County Jail, before his transfer to San Quentin and ultimately Folsom Prison, inmates staged a jailbreak around him. Five men attacked Russo, causing a riot and an attempt to overtake the guards. Gunfire eventually ended the uproar.
In March, police connected two violent incidents at Mimi Imperato’s cafe to his kidnapping and the Black Hand, but Imperato refused to talk. He had allegedly rejected a bootlegger’s offer to sell him supplies, which resulted in Imperato’s vehicle being riddled with bullets. Ten days later, a bomb exploded outside his cafe in the middle of the night, while his family was asleep upstairs. Fifty windows in the neighborhood were shattered, but no one was injured. The three men arrested for the bombing were Armando Gentile, singer Baldo Bellini, and Nick Valle, described as a Black Hand leader.
Mimi Imperato & Baldo Bellini
Around this time, Black Tony sent Phil Gargano to New York to pick up thousands of ounces of morphine and cocaine, and hundreds of pounds of raw opium. He would meet Black Tony at the train station in Los Angeles before bringing the product to San Francisco, where he sold it at wholesale prices. Parmagini reportedly put Gargano in control of the money and payoff accounts. Shortly after one of their meetings, Gargano picked up his first drug-related arrest in San Francisco when he gave a $100 handshake to an unsuspecting federal agent.
After the agent learned he was with Black Tony, they worked out a deal: Gargano would lead them to a score for leniency consideration. He planted a trunk with fifty ounces of morphine in an empty apartment in exchange for a six-month sentence. With the help of the agent, Gargano served the latter part of his term at the Marin County Jail in San Rafael, where Evelyn had moved, so they could see each other every day.
In 1928, Rocco Russo’s father, Giuseppe, paid a $7,000 ($130,000) bribe to a “friend,” Giuseppe Alioto, local fish dealer and brother of Mariano (killed by the Pedone-LaFata gang in 1917), to pass on to prison officials for his son’s release. Russo’s parents would try for years to free their son. The following year, Rocco’s brother, John, was killed in a Hoboken candy shop owned by another brother, Vincenzo. John was accused of assaulting Vincenzo’s daughter, Lillian, and boasting about it. Though witnesses had seen Vincenzo with a gun earlier that day, Lillian Russo confessed to shooting, stabbing, and beating her uncle John to death.
Vincenzo & Lillian Russo
In late 1929, Tony Parmagini and partner William “Jew Willie” Levin were arrested when making a sale to an undercover agent assisted by ex-convict and informant Danny Farrell. During the trial, Black Tony was accused of attempting to fix the case through San Francisco politician August (Gus) Oliva. The jury deliberated only forty minutes, and in July 1930, Black Tony and Jew Willie were convicted on five counts of violating federal narcotics acts. They were each fined $17,000 ($320,000) and sentenced to 17 years. The scope of Black Tony’s operation extended from Mexico to Canada to Colorado, and after his conviction, state narcotics agents reported that the price of illegal morphine on the west coast had more than tripled.
William “Jew Willie” Levin & Gus Oliva
By April 1930, Mike LaFata was operating a soft drink parlor on Columbus Avenue. His wife, Anna Ribera, died later that month. Their nephew, John, was working as a bookie and had recently moved to Brooklyn. On August 13, federal agents surveilled a man pick up a suitcase at the Ferry Building, load it into a truck, and drive away. They followed the truck for several blocks when another man climbed aboard. The agents pulled the truck over and uncovered at least $60,000 (over $1M) worth of one-ounce morphine cans in the trunk, shipped from New York by John LaFata. One of largest seizures in local history, it was reported that the contraband could supply “San Francisco’s legitimate needs” for more than a year.
Arrested were Antonio Piazza and Antonio Grimando. Piazza worked as a chauffeur and Grimando was a cigar salesman and, like Frank Bruno, a fisherman for the Alaska Packing Company. Piazza was acquitted after testifying he didn’t know the contents of the trunk. Grimando pled guilty and was sentenced to eight years, eventually succumbing to influenza and pneumonia at McNeil Island Penitentiary in February 1935. Ten days after their arrests, Mike LaFata was indicted as the ringleader in San Francisco while John LaFata was arrested in New York. Both men would serve terms and be released by 1935.
By early 1931, following the convictions of Black Tony and the LaFatas, Phil Gargano became a main point-of-contact for federal agents on the payroll. Local narcotics agents became friendly with him, often hanging out at his apartment overnight and describing new agents or informants he should be aware of. In March 1932, $3,300 ($76,000) was stolen from the safe at the Million Dollar Theater in Los Angeles. The burglars, Samuel Simon (aka George Miller) and Ruth Hornbeck, were hijacked by Phil Gargano, Frank Ferrari, and Los Angeles Detective Lieutenant George Brown. All, except Detective Brown, were convicted of grand theft. Brown was exonerated when he claimed he was conducting an investigation when the hijacking took place. Ruth Hornbeck was the wife of Keystone Studios film editor William Hornbeck, who would later be described as one of the best editors in the motion picture industry.
Phil Gargano, Frank Ferrari, Samuel Simon, Ruth & William Hornbeck
Pete LaFata died in Brooklyn on December 28, 1934. He was buried at Saint Joseph’s Cemetery in Middletown, New York. When Phil Gargano was released from San Quentin in March 1935, he was reportedly broke and borrowed money from a narcotics agent to get back on his feet. In July, Rocco Russo’s parole application was denied, as it had been several times already. His ex-wife, who had divorced him some time after his incarceration, re-married that month. Russo’s mother, Rosa, also sparked an investigation into the alleged “parole shakedown” racket when she inquired as to why the money paid to Giuseppe Alioto seven years earlier didn’t secure her son’s release.
Alioto admitted he had received money from the Russos, and that it was to be split between prison officials, but denied that they had received the money. In January 1935, Alioto and Dr. Fred Carfagni, North Beach dentist implicated in another “parole peddling” case, visited Russo in Folsom Prison. They allegedly told him that a deal for his pardon had fallen through, but that they arranged to have him released on a deportation parole. Alioto claimed the money was paid to a friend, fruit broker Leon Siroon in Fresno, but that Siroon had been “killed in the east.” (No record of Siroon - alive or dead - was found after 1930.)
Giuseppe Alioto, Dr. Fred Carfagni, Leon Siroon Ad
District Attorney Matthew Brady doubted that Alioto could be prosecuted, even if his involvement was illegal, due to the statute of limitations. Worth noting, at this time, is that Giuseppe Alioto was business partners with Francesco Lanza in the Exposition Fish Grotto at Fisherman’s Wharf. Lanza was then the rappresentante (boss) of the San Francisco borgata (mafia family) until his death - from natural causes - on June 14, 1937. He was succeeded by Antonio Lima.
District Attorney Matthew Brady, the Exposition Fish Grotto, Antonio Lima
In February of that year, Mario Balistreri was arrested in connection to the gang for selling opium to an undercover agent. Balistreri, who was previously convicted on narcotics violations, had recently been released from Leavenworth on parole. He owned the Redwood Village and Silver Bowl dance halls, the Cooperage liquor store, and dealt in scrap metal. He also had connections in Kansas City, New Orleans, New Jersey, Phoenix, Minneapolis, Canada, and Mexico. After his arrest, Balistreri said that his lawyer was “hooked up with every big mobster in the country and could get him fixed up no matter what.”
On May 1, 1937, Antone “Black Tony” Parmagini lost a battle to intestinal cancer while incarcerated in Leavenworth Prison. Newspapers poked fun at the irony of his dependence on morphine in his final days. Later that month, federal agents arrested three more men connected to the dope ring - Joseph “Lemon Head” Silvestri, Anthony “Tony Mello” Cosenza (both arrested in San Francisco), and James “Tibby” Cirimele (arrested in Reno).
Silvestri was a shoemaker and known associate of Eddie Quinones, then San Francisco’s “Public Enemy Number One.” He had previous arrests for narcotics and suspected murder. Cosenza was a bartender in San Francisco, and Cirimele was a bartender at the Black Derby nightclub in Reno. Cirimele was also a manager and bodyguard for his uncle, Salvatore “Tar Baby” Terrano, a boxer who was involved in narcotics trafficking between San Francisco and Nevada. Silvestri and Cirimele had over $1,000 ($22,000) worth of morphine on them at the time of their arrests. Authorities alleged that Silvestri supplied the street peddlers and wholesale trade.
Joseph “Lemon Head” Silvestri, Eddie Quinones, James “Tibby” Cirimele & Salvatore “Tar Baby” Terrano
Tony Cosenza and his brother, Francesco “Cow” Cosenza, both had previous convictions for manslaughter. Frank, who ran a newspaper route for San Francisco’s Call-Bulletin, killed a pedestrian with his vehicle, and Tony was involved in a Columbus Avenue poolroom brawl that left one man dead. Their sister, Roseline, married Salvatore Maugeri in 1921. Sam Maugeri was a concessionaire at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and a partner in the narcotics business.
Antonio “Tony Mello” Cosenza, Francesco “Cow” Cosenza, Rose & Sam Maugeri
As Silvestri, Cosenza, and Cirimele were being rounded up, Secret Service agents also closed in on what they described as a notorious Sicilian counterfeiting ring that had been circulating bogus money across the US. Mario Balistreri and Salvatore Taranto were indicted as the local leaders, along with three others. Balistreri was sentenced to 15 years; Taranto five. Sal Taranto was later identified as a soldier in the San Francisco family who had been made (inducted) along with Francesco “Jimmy Pasqua” Scappatura under Tony Lima’s leadership.
Salvatore Taranto & Frank Scappatura
Their ceremony took place at the Lima Ranch in Lodi, and was attended by high-ranking mafiosi Vincenzo “Papa” LaRocca, Filippo “Little Phil” Maita, Gaspare “Bill” Sciortino, and Francesco “Frank Carroll” Garofalo, underboss of the Bonanno family. While based in New York, Garofalo kept an apartment in Merced, California, where he operated the High Grade Packing Company with James “Jimmy the Hat” Lanza, Frank’s son and future boss of the San Francisco family. High Grade was suspected of being a conduit for heroin trafficking.
Vince LaRocca, Phil Maita, Bill Sciortino, Frank Garofalo, Jimmy Lanza
On July 8, 1937, agents raided the San Francisco apartment of Phil and Evelyn Gargano as they received a package containing 30 ounces of morphine air shipped by John LaFata in Brooklyn. The next day, LaFata was arrested in New York. They were charged with the first aerial transcontinental narcotics operation on record. The following month, Mike LaFata was arrested and sent to McNeil Island after selling two ounces of morphine to an undercover agent.
Phil Gargano’s testimony, in January 1938, was regarded as one of the most startling in the government’s battle with organized narcotics traffic. He revealed systematic payments to officers, gifts to their families, and attending parties together. He also exposed a narcotics protection ring involving at least six federal agents who warned dealers of raids and guarded trunk loads of product against hijackers. One agent was quoted as saying, “Our boss (a narcotics supervisor in San Francisco) is the dirtiest man I ever saw and would pinch his own mother if he had a chance.”
Gargano described a decade of lucrative drug sales, claiming that everybody in San Francisco knew that if they bought from him they were well-protected. Evelyn Gargano attempted to shield her husband by taking the full blame. In the process, she implicated her uncle, Mike LaFata, in the operation. However, after just two hours, the jury found Phil Gargano guilty on all counts. He was sentenced to 12 years and fined $3,000 ($67,000).
Attorney Leo Collins, Phil Gargano, Evelyn LaFata Gargano & Children
Following Gargano’s testimony, Mario Balistreri was returned to San Francisco from McNeil Island to face trial on his narcotics charge. Through the investigation, it was learned that female entertainers at Balistreri’s nightclubs were responsible for supplying drugs to brothels in San Francisco. Just after midnight on May 25, 1938, narcotics and Secret Service agents simultaneously raided several of Balistreri’s establishments and arrested a variety of racketeers. His sentence was increased to 27 years.
In January 1940, Rocco Russo wrote a letter to the governor saying that he and his mother would accept deportation if commutation were granted. He also said that he was on his honeymoon in Detroit when Rosolino LaFata was killed, and that his brother John, killed in 1929, was the real killer. Russo claimed he had been protecting his brother, who allegedly admitted to the murder before his death. Between this time and 1927, Russo’s parole had been denied six times. A year and a half later, five thousand inmates at San Quentin held a surprise party for the one-year anniversary of warden Clinton Duffy, who was introducing more progressive policies at the penitentiary. Duffy was presented with a portrait made by Rocco Russo.
On May 5, 1942, Joe Silvestri was trailed for 12 hours by three officers who suspected him of possessing drugs. At San Jose and Niagara Avenues, Silvestri turned towards the officers, put his hand in his pocket, and said, “You’ll never get me. I’ll shoot first.” One officer responded with a single shot that hit Silvestri in the neck, killing him instantly. He did not have a gun on him, but was carrying three packages of morphine. A month prior, Silvestri’s wife, Dorothy, was charged with bigamy when two sailors who returned to San Francisco claimed she had already married them both.
Joe Silvestri, Dorothy Silvestri & Other Husbands
Mike LaFata was active through the mid-1940s, frequenting North Beach locations like LaRocca’s Corner (Vince’s bar), along with James Franzone and Calogero “Big Nose Charlie” LaGaipa. Franzone was a reported capo (captain) with the Chicago Outfit and associate of Al Capone’s cousin and bodyguard, Charles Fischetti, as well as the Antinoris in Florida, and the LaFatch brothers in Ohio. In Chicago, he operated the Gem Dye Mold Company with Hymie (Herman) “Loud Mouth”’ Levin and Nick DeJohn.
Franzone kept residences in Chicago and Florida when he moved to Bay Street in San Francisco by 1942. In the city, he ran the Poodle Dog restaurant on Polk Street in partnership with DeJohn’s brother, Anthony DiJohn. The brothers (born DiGiovanni) had relocated from Chicago to Santa Rosa, north of San Francisco. Anthony’s wife, Sophie Franzone, was a cousin to James. Along with the Franzones and DiGiovannis came another Chicago transplant, Leonard Calamia, described as a wholesale narcotics trafficker and professional killer for the mafia.
James Franzone, Nick DeJohn, Tony DiJohn, Sophie Franzone DiJohn, Leonard Calamia
Charlie LaGaipa was an opium peddler from New York, a reported relative of the Manganos, and an associate of Nicola Gentile (who had transferred to the San Francisco family temporarily in the 1920s). LaGaipa was allegedly introduced in 1923 by Vito Genovese to Charles “Lucky” Luciano, who helped finance his dope operation. In the early 1940s, he moved to Santa Cruz, where he operated a hotel-restaurant called the Red Devil Inn and partnered with Sam Maugeri, among other local mobsters.
In 1944, LaGaipa was accused of shorting Joseph “The Eye” Tocco in a drug deal, which led to a sitdown involving several California gangsters, including Marco “Mimi” Li Mandri, Alphonse LaRocca (Vince’s nephew), and San Francisco consigliere (counselor) Sam Lima (Tony’s uncle). Acting as judge, Lima was reportedly dissatisfied with LaGaipa’s response, and on June 6, 1944, Big Nose Charlie LaGaipa disappeared. His car was found in Oakland with brain tissue on the dashboard.
Calogero "Big Nose Charlie" LaGaipa, Joseph "The Eye" Tocco, Mimi Li Mandri, Alphonse LaRocca, Sam Lima
Rocco Russo registered for the World War II draft from San Quentin and was paroled by August 5, 1943. Two years later, he was deported to Italy. In November 1945, only three months after his deportation, he returned to the United States illegally as a stowaway on an Italian steamship at the Port of Baltimore. Using the alias “Tom Nogare,” Russo went to Sandusky, Ohio, where Frank Brancato got him a job at the Terrace Club. Brancato was a high-ranking long-time member of the Cleveland family and close associate of John Scalish. Meanwhile, Mike LaFata died quietly in the middle of the night on November 24, 1946, in an apartment he owned in Galveston, Texas. He was buried at the LaFata family plot at the Italian Cemetery in Colma.
Frank Brancato & John Scalish
In Ohio, Rocco Russo met a woman 22 years his junior that would become the mother of his children. When Jean (last name unknown; aka Russo, Nogare, Ferraro) first got pregnant, Russo reportedly forced her to undergo an illegal abortion because his ex-wife said she would re-marry him if he were childless. Jean and Russo not only stayed together, but got pregnant again. Their daughter, Rosa, was born on January 18, 1947. A few months later, Jean got pregnant for a third time. Rocco Jr. was born on January 11, 1948.
While the couple was in the hospital, they left baby Rosa with the family of Rosario (Roy) Barone, a barber they had been living with. On January 13, Rosa died under the Barones’ care. Russo accused Barone of neglect and, on several occasions, would threaten or attempt to shoot him. On April 8, 1950, a bomb was detonated in the basement of Roy Barone’s house with his family inside. Nobody was injured but it caused significant damage.
Later that day, Russo and Salvatore Brancato, Frank’s brother, were in a car accident near Cleveland. Police traced the car, registered to “Jean Nogare,” to a trailer park in Northfield. In searching the vehicle, they found a .45 pistol and bomb-making materials. They also found a police uniform, badges, and a $1,000 bill, which were linked to the home burglary of Benjamin (Benny) Mason.
Benny Mason operated a popular farm-resort and jazz club called Mason’s Farm and reportedly ran a numbers racket. In December 1949, four men - two dressed as police officers - broke into his home, blew open the basement safe, and left with $15,000 ($200,000). A month after the bombing, Russo was arrested when he walked into the Northfield police station to report his wife and son missing.
Rocco Russo’s trial was highlighted by outbursts and arguments, with Jean testifying that she lived in fear of Russo. She claimed he was abusive, made her use aliases, and that they never married. Following Jean’s initial testimony, Russo asked to use the courthouse restroom. With his handcuffs removed, he pulled out a razor blade and slashed his own throat, stomach, and arm. He was found slumped over in a stall, calling out for his son.
In February 1951, after what was considered one of the most colorful arrests in Erie County history, Rocco Russo was convicted of possessing explosives and sentenced to 1-20 years in the Ohio State Penitentiary. Russo spent over nine more years behind bars (over 25 total), and died of a heart attack in prison on May 18, 1960.
