Vito Genovese
On the 2nd of June 1958, Vito Genovese sat before the McClellan Hearings of the United States Senate on organized crime, called there under subpoena. He answered nothing. Instead, he cited his Fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution 150 separate times. Genovese was an Italian-born American mafioso who led the New York crime family that the FBI renamed after him in 1957. He had grown up alongside Lucky Luciano and helped turn the Mafia into a major force in American organized crime. Yet this was also a man who backed Benito Mussolini's Fascist regime for a time, and who later won the trust of the American Army. How did an immigrant boy who left school at about the fifth-grade level climb so high? Why did a murder case against him fall apart? And what finally ended his reign, with a fellow prisoner playing a part?
Vito Genovese was born on the 21st of November 1897 in Risigliano, a frazione of the comune of Tufino in the Province of Naples. His parents were Frances Felice Genovese and Nunziata Aluotto. He had a sister, Giovanna Jennie, who married Ricciotto Prisco. Two brothers, Michael and Carmine, later joined his crime family, and a cousin named Michael became boss of the Pittsburgh crime family.
In 1913, when Vito was 15, the family crossed the Atlantic aboard the SS Taormina. They settled in New York City's Little Italy.
His first crimes were thefts of merchandise from pushcart vendors, along with errands for local mobsters. Later he collected money from people who played illegal lotteries. At 19, he spent a year in prison for illegal possession of a firearm.
By the 1920s, Genovese was working for Giuseppe "Joe the Boss" Masseria. Masseria ran a powerful Manhattan gang that would evolve into the family Genovese eventually led. Meanwhile, Charlie Luciano and his close associates worked for the gambler Arnold "The Brain" Rothstein. Rothstein saw the windfall that Prohibition offered and taught Luciano to run bootleg alcohol as a business. Luciano, Frank Costello and Genovese then started their own bootlegging operation, financed by Rothstein.
In 1931, Genovese's first wife, Donata Ragone, died of tuberculosis. He quickly announced that he would marry Anna Petillo, who was already married to a man named Gerard Vernotico. On the 16th of March 1932, Vernotico was found strangled on a Manhattan rooftop. On the 28th of March, Genovese married his widow. Anna was also his cousin, through her mother, Concetta y Cassini Genovese.
In 1935, looking for a country retreat for his family, Genovese bought a mansion in rural Middletown Township, New Jersey. Its grounds were landscaped into Italian gardens meant to recall his homeland, complete with a small rock replica of Mount Vesuvius. Today the site is a public botanical garden called Deep Cut Gardens. The mansion burned down in 1937 while Genovese was away in Italy, and it was never rebuilt. His family afterward lived quietly in a house in Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey.
On the 26th of February 1930, Genovese allegedly ambushed Gaetano Reina outside his mistress's house in the Bronx. He is said to have shot Reina in the back of the head with a shotgun. Reina led a Bronx-based gang and had been an ally of Masseria. But Masseria began to suspect that Reina was secretly helping his archrival, the Brooklyn gang leader Salvatore Maranzano. After the killing, Masseria took direct control of the Reina gang.
In early 1930, open war broke out between Masseria and Maranzano. Luciano made a secret deal with Maranzano. In return for becoming Maranzano's second-in-command and receiving Masseria's rackets, he agreed to engineer the death of his own boss.
On the 15th of April 1931, Luciano lured Masseria to a meeting at a Coney Island restaurant called Nuova Villa Tammaro. While the two men played cards, Luciano allegedly excused himself to the bathroom. The gunmen were reportedly Genovese, Albert Anastasia, Joe Adonis and Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel. Ciro "The Artichoke King" Terranova drove the getaway car. Legend has it that he was too shaken to drive away and had to be shoved out of the driver's seat by Siegel. Luciano took over Masseria's family, and Genovese became his underboss.
By September 1931, Luciano had heard that Maranzano planned to kill him and Genovese. On the 10th of September, Maranzano summoned Luciano, Genovese and Frank Costello to his office. They knew he intended to kill them there. Luciano struck first and sent four Jewish gangsters to the office instead. Maranzano's people did not know their faces. Luciano had secured them with help from Meyer Lansky and Siegel.
Luciano then created The Commission to serve as the governing body for organized crime. Years later, its members would become the audience for Genovese's most dangerous scheming.
On the 19th of September 1934, Genovese and five associates allegedly shot and killed the mobster Ferdinand Boccia in a Brooklyn coffee shop. The two men had conspired to cheat a wealthy gambler out of $150,000 in a high-stakes card game. Boccia then demanded a share of $35,000, because he had introduced the victim to Genovese. Rather than pay Boccia anything, Genovese allegedly decided to have him murdered.
On the 18th of June 1936, Luciano was sentenced to 30-50 years in prison after a conviction for pandering. Genovese became acting boss of the Luciano crime family. On the 25th of November 1936, he became a naturalized United States citizen in New York City.
On the 10th of January 1937, fearing prosecution for the Boccia murder, Genovese fled to Italy. He carried $750,000 in cash and settled in the city of Nola, near Naples. Costello became acting boss in his absence.
In Italy, Genovese bribed some Fascist party members and became a friend of Galeazzo Ciano, Mussolini's son-in-law. It is believed that he supplied Ciano with cocaine. By the end of World War II, Genovese had donated nearly $4 million to the Fascist party. He helped create a new party headquarters in Nola. For that, he was awarded the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus and made a commendatore.
In 1943, Genovese allegedly ordered the murder of Carlo Tresca, publisher of an anarchist newspaper in New York and an enemy of Mussolini. He allegedly arranged it as a favor to the Italian government. On the 11th of January 1943, a gunman shot Tresca dead outside his newspaper office in Manhattan. The shooter was later alleged to be Carmine Galante of the Bonanno crime family. No one was ever charged. Genovese's position in Italy was about to change.
Charles Poletti, a former governor of New York then attached to the U.S. Army, accepted a 1938 Packard Sedan as a personal gift from Genovese. When the Allies invaded Italy in September 1943, Genovese had switched sides and quickly offered his services to the Army. He was appointed interpreter and liaison officer at the Army headquarters in Naples. He soon became one of the most trusted employees of the Allied Military Government for Occupied Territories, known as AMGOT. Poletti and the entire AMGOT department were unaware of his history.
Genovese built one of the largest black market operations in southern Italy, working with the Cosa Nostra boss Calogero Vizzini. Vizzini sent truck caravans loaded with basic food commodities north toward hungry Naples, where Genovese's organization distributed the cargoes. The trucks carried passes and export papers issued by the AMGOT administration in Naples and Sicily. Some corrupt American army officers even contributed gasoline and trucks. Luke Monzelli, a Carabinieri lieutenant assigned to follow Genovese, described food shipments moving from Vizzini to Genovese with proper documents. He said men in authority had certified them, and that these men were Mafia members serving Vizzini and Genovese.
In the summer of 1944, back in New York, the mobster Ernest "The Hawk" Rupolo implicated Genovese in the Boccia murder. Facing a murder conviction himself, Rupolo had decided to become a government witness.
On the 27th of August 1944, U.S. military police arrested Genovese in Italy during an investigation of his black market ring. He had been stealing trucks, flour and sugar from the Army. Agent Orange C. Dickey of the Criminal Investigation Division examined his background and found that he was a fugitive wanted for the 1934 Boccia killing. Yet the Army and the federal government showed little interest in pursuing him.
After months of frustration, Dickey prepared to ship Genovese back to New York to face trial. Genovese personally offered him a $250,000 bribe to let him go. When Dickey refused, Genovese threatened him. Dickey's superiors in the military chain of command even told him to stop pursuing the case, but he refused to be dissuaded.
On the 2nd of June 1945, a day after arriving in New York by ship, Genovese was arraigned on murder charges. He pleaded not guilty. Peter LaTempa, a witness, had earlier been found dead in a cell where he was held in protective custody. On the 10th of June 1946, another prosecution witness, Jerry Esposito, was found shot to death beside a road in Norwood, New Jersey. Without anyone to corroborate Rupolo's testimony, the government's case collapsed. The charges were dismissed that same day. Judge Samuel Leibowitz told Genovese: "I cannot speak for the jury, but I believe that if there were even a shred of corroborating evidence, you would have been condemned to the (electric) chair."
Genovese walked free, but the family he returned to was not eager to hand back his old power.
In December 1946, Meyer Lansky called the heads of the major crime families to a conference in Havana, held at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba. It lasted a little more than a week. Three topics were on the table: the heroin trade, Cuban gambling, and what to do about Bugsy Siegel and his floundering Flamingo Hotel project in Las Vegas. Neither Costello nor his underboss Willie Moretti would return power to Genovese.
On the 20th of December, during the conference, Genovese met privately with Luciano in his hotel suite. Unlike Costello, Luciano had never trusted him. Genovese tried to persuade Luciano to become a titular boss of bosses and let Genovese run everything. Luciano rejected the idea: "There is no Boss of Bosses. I turned it down in front of everybody. If I ever change my mind, I will take the title. But it won't be up to you. Right now you work for me and I ain't in the mood to retire. Don't you ever let me hear this again, or I'll lose my temper."
Genovese was left as a capo over his former Greenwich Village crew. On the 4th of October 1951, the Mafia Commission ordered Moretti assassinated. The bosses disliked his testimony in the Kefauver Hearings. They also feared that, with syphilis now affecting his brain, he might start talking to the press. Costello then appointed Genovese as his new underboss.
Anna Genovese had moved out of the New Jersey family home in 1951. In December 1952, she sued her husband for financial support and asked the judge for $350 per week. She later sought a divorce in 1953 and testified about his involvement in criminal rackets, an unheard-of action for the wife of a mob figure. Vito filed a counter-suit for divorce on grounds of desertion. According to Anna, he ruled the Italian lottery in New York and New Jersey, which brought in over $1 million per year. She said he also owned four Greenwich Village night clubs, a dog track in Virginia and other legitimate businesses. Both claims were dismissed by the New Jersey Superior Court appellate division in 1954.
In 1953, Genovese allegedly ordered the murder of the mobster Steven Franse. He had tasked Franse with supervising Anna while he hid in Italy. Outraged by her possible love affairs and her lawsuit, he ordered Joseph Valachi to set up the killing. On the 18th of June 1953, Valachi lured Franse to his restaurant in the Bronx. There, Pasquale Pagano and Fiore Siano, Valachi's nephew, strangled him.
During the mid-1950s, Genovese decided to move against Costello. He first needed to remove Costello's strong Commission ally, Albert Anastasia, so he conspired with Anastasia's underboss, Carlo Gambino.
In early 1957, Genovese ordered Vincent Gigante to murder Costello. On the 2nd of May 1957, Gigante shot and wounded Costello outside his apartment building. The wound was superficial, but it persuaded Costello to give up power and retire. A doorman identified Gigante as the gunman. In 1958, however, Costello testified that he could not recognize his attacker, and Gigante was acquitted of attempted murder. Genovese became boss of what is now known as the Genovese crime family. He promoted his longtime lieutenant, Anthony Strollo, to underboss.
In late 1957, Genovese and Gambino allegedly ordered Anastasia's murder, after Genovese heard rumors that Costello was plotting with Anastasia to regain power. On the 25th of October 1957, Anastasia sat in a barber chair at the Park Central Hotel in Midtown Manhattan for a haircut and shave. Two men with their faces covered by scarves shot him dead. Witnesses could not identify the gunmen, and competing theories about who they were still exist. The killing removed the strongest voice on the Commission among Genovese's rivals.
Stefano "The Undertaker" Magaddino, the Buffalo boss and a Commission member, was Genovese's choice to organize a national Cosa Nostra meeting in November 1957. Genovese wanted it to legitimize his new power. Magaddino in turn chose Joseph Barbara, a crime boss in northeastern Pennsylvania, and Barbara's underboss, Russell Bufalino, to handle the arrangements.
The agenda covered Cuba, particularly the gambling and narcotics smuggling interests of Cosa Nostra on the island. It also covered the international narcotics trade. The New York garment industry was on the list too, with its rackets such as loansharking to business owners and control of garment center trucking.
On the 14th of November 1957, powerful mafiosi from the United States and Italy convened at Barbara's estate in Apalachin, New York. State trooper Edgar D. Croswell had learned that Barbara's son was reserving rooms in local hotels. A large quantity of meat had also been delivered to the Barbara home from a local butcher. Suspicious, Croswell kept an eye on the house. When the state police found many luxury cars parked there, they began taking down license plate numbers. Many of the cars belonged to known criminals. Reinforcements arrived and set up a roadblock.
When the mobsters discovered the police presence, they fled the gathering by car and on foot. Many escaped through the woods surrounding the estate.
At the roadblock, police stopped a car driven by Bufalino. His passengers included Genovese and three other men. Bufalino said he had come to visit his sick friend, Barbara. Genovese said he had simply come for a barbecue and to discuss business with Barbara. The police let him go.
Not every leader had come. Anthony Carfano had skipped the meeting in protest of the murder attempt on Costello.
On the 7th of July 1958, Genovese was indicted on charges of conspiring to import and sell narcotics. Luciano allegedly helped pay part of $100,000 to a Puerto Rican drug dealer to falsely implicate him. That dealer, Nelson Cantellops, was the government's star witness and claimed that Genovese had met with him. On the 4th of April 1959, Genovese was convicted of conspiracy to violate federal narcotics laws. On the 17th of April, he was sentenced to 15 years in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, where he tried to run his crime family from prison.
When the Supreme Court declined to review his case, he hired the lawyer Edward Bennett Williams. In October 1963, Williams appeared before the Court of Appeals, which rejected the appeal. Selwyn Raab, a longtime organized-crime reporter, wrote in his book Five Families that detectives, lawyers and experts have questioned the conviction. The longtime NYPD detective Ralph Salerno argued that anyone who understands the protocol and insulation procedures of the Mafia would find it almost unbelievable that a crime boss would be directly involved in a drug operation.
On the 25th of September 1959, Carfano and a female companion were found shot to death in his Cadillac on a residential street in Jackson Heights, Queens. Genovese had allegedly ordered the killing.
In April 1962, Genovese allegedly ordered the murder of Anthony Strollo, concluding that Strollo was part of the plot that put him in prison. On the 8th of April, Strollo left his house for a walk and was never seen again. His body was never recovered.
In June 1962, Genovese supposedly accused Valachi, also imprisoned in Atlanta, of being an informer and gave him the kiss of death. Genovese had placed a $100,000 bounty on Valachi. In July, Valachi supposedly mistook another inmate for a mob hitman and killed him. After receiving a life sentence for that murder, Valachi became a government witness.
On the 24th of August 1964, the body of Ernest Rupolo was recovered from Jamaica Bay in Queens. His killers had tied his hands and attached two concrete blocks to his legs. It was widely assumed that Genovese had ordered Rupolo's murder for testifying against him in the 1944 Boccia case.
Genovese died of a heart attack on the 14th of February 1969 at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri. He is buried in Saint John Cemetery in Middle Village, Queens. The family that carried his name later passed to Vincent Gigante, the man he had mentored after returning from Italy.
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Common questions
Who was Vito Genovese?
Vito Genovese was an Italian-born American mafioso who led the Genovese crime family in New York City. He was born on the 21st of November 1897 in Risigliano, in the Province of Naples, and was a childhood friend and criminal associate of Lucky Luciano.
Why is the Genovese crime family named after Vito Genovese?
The FBI renamed Luciano's crime family after Vito Genovese in 1957. He had taken control of it from Frank Costello that year, after Vincent Gigante shot and wounded Costello on the 2nd of May 1957.
What happened at the Apalachin meeting that Vito Genovese attended?
On the 14th of November 1957, state police raided a gathering of mafiosi at Joseph Barbara's estate in Apalachin, New York. Trooper Edgar D. Croswell had grown suspicious and set up a roadblock, and many attendees fled through the woods.
Why did Vito Genovese go to prison?
Vito Genovese was convicted on the 4th of April 1959 of conspiracy to violate federal narcotics laws. On the 17th of April 1959 he was sentenced to 15 years in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary.
How did Vito Genovese escape the Boccia murder charge?
The government's case collapsed because witnesses were killed and no one could corroborate Ernest Rupolo's testimony. The charges were dismissed on the 10th of June 1946, and Judge Samuel Leibowitz said a shred of corroborating evidence would have sent Genovese to the electric chair.
Why did Vito Genovese flee to Italy in 1937?
Vito Genovese fled to Italy on the 10th of January 1937 because he feared prosecution for the Boccia murder. He took $750,000 in cash and settled in Nola, near Naples.
How did Joe Valachi become connected to Vito Genovese?
Joseph Valachi was Genovese's underling and was imprisoned with him in Atlanta. After Genovese allegedly placed a $100,000 bounty on him, Valachi killed an inmate he mistook for a hitman and then became a government witness.
When and where did Vito Genovese die?
Vito Genovese died of a heart attack on the 14th of February 1969 at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri. He is buried in Saint John Cemetery in Middle Village, Queens.
All sources
88 references cited across the entry
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- 3BookMafia Summit: J. Edgar Hoover, the Kennedy Brothers, and the Meeting That Unmasked the MobGil Reavill — Macmillan — 2013
- 7History of Deep Cut GardensMonmouth County Parks System
- 8NewsShore Showplace wrecked by flames28 February 1937
- 10BookThe Deadly Don: Vito Genovese, Mafia BossAnthony M. DeStefano — Kensington Publishing Corp. — 2021
- 13BookThe Mafia encyclopediaCarl Sifakis — Facts on File — 2005
- 16NewsConey Island's Big HitMichael Pollak — June 29, 2012
- 17Sifakis, (2005). pp. 87–88
- 18BookThe Last Testament of Lucky LucianoMartin A. Gosch et al. — Little, Brown — 1975
- 19BookMafia dynasty : the rise and fall of the Gambino crime familyJohn H. Davis — HarperPaperbacks — 1994
- 21BookTough JewsRich Cohen — Vintage Books — 1999
- 22NewsThe Commission's Origins1986
- 23BookOrganized crimeHoward Abadinsky — Wadsworth/Cengage Learning — 2010
- 24BookThe Valachi papersPeter Maas — Perennial — 2003
- 25The Gangster's GardenValerie Sudol — April 23, 2012
- 26NewsFugitive Miranda Gives UpSeptember 17, 1946
- 27NewsAMG Aide in Italy Held in Murder Here.November 25, 1944
- 29NewsLucania Sentenced to 30 to 50 Years; Court Warns RingJune 19, 1936
- 31BookItalian Americans: The History and Culture of a PeopleEric Martone — Abc-Clio — December 12, 2016
- 32BookMafia SummitGil Reavil — January 22, 2013
- 33BookThe Mafia at Apalachin, 1957Michael Newton — 2012
- 34NewsAssassin Slays Tresca, Radical, In Fifth AvenueJanuary 12, 1943
- 35NewsObscure Gangster Emerging as Mafia Chief in New YorkLucinda Franks — February 20, 1977
- 37BookMafia Summit: J. Edgar Hoover, The Kennedy Brothers, and the Meeting That Unmasked the MobGill Reavill — St. Martin's Press — 2013
- 40NewsPrisoner's Story Breaks 4 Murders by Brooklyn RingAugust 9, 1944
- 42NewsGenovese Denies Guit.June 3, 1945
- 43NewsGang-Ride Victim Thrown in BrushJune 9, 1946
- 44NewsGenovese is Freed of Murder ChargeJune 11, 1946
- 45English, p. 28
- 46NewsMoretti is Buried in Gangster StyleWilliam R. Conklin — October 9, 1951
- 471953-Anna Genovese testifies against husband VitoFebruary 23, 1969
- 48NewsWife Suing GenoveseDecember 10, 1952
- 49News1954-Vito Genovese faces divorce and deportation caseJanuary 28, 1954
- 51The secret rulers: criminal syndicates and how they control the U.S. underworldFred J. Cook — Duell, Sloan & Pearce — 1966
- 54Davis, pp. 78-79
- 55NewsFederal Attack, Internal Fights Trouble Crime ClanRay McHugh — August 26, 1963
- 56NewsCostello is Shot Entering Home; Gunman Escapes WoundMay 3, 1957
- 58NewsAnastasia Slain in a Hotel Here; Led Murder, Inc.October 26, 1957
- 59NewsGlynn:Area delegates attended mob conventionDon Glynn — November 11, 2007
- 60NewsNarcotic Traffic Called Topic In Apalachin TalksAssociated Press — February 28, 1960
- 61NewsNarcotics Agent Calls Racketeers Black-HandersJuly 1, 1958
- 62NewsTop U.S. Hoods Are Run Out of Area After 'Sick Call' on BarbaraWoodie Fitchette et al. — November 15, 1957
- 63NewsHoods Run Out of Area--Woodie Fitchette et al. — November 15, 1957
- 64NewsFor Sale, a House WithAcreage.Connections Extra;Site of 1957 Gangland Raid Is Part of Auction on SaturdayRalph Blumenthal — July 31, 2002
- 65NewsEdgar D. Croswell, 77, Sergeant Who Upset '57 Mob Meeting, DiesAlfonso A. Narvaez — November 21, 1990
- 66NewsHost To Hoodlum Meet Dies Of Heart AttackJune 18, 1959
- 69NewsGenovese Depicts Apalchin VisitEmanuel Perlmutter — June 17, 1959
- 70NewsGenovese Invokes the Fifth 150 Times in Mafia StudyJoseph A. Loftus — July 3, 1958
- 71Sifakis, p. 186
- 72NewsU.S. July Indicts Genovese, Gigante, in Narcotics PlotJuly 8, 1958
- 73NewsGenovese Guilty in Narcotics PlotApril 4, 1959
- 74NewsGenovese is Given 15 Years in Prison in Narcotics CaseAlexander Feinberg — April 18, 1959
- 75NewsJersey Mafia Guided From Prison by GenoveseCharles Grutzner — December 25, 1968
- 76MagazineThe Supreme Court: Boss of All Bosses1 November 1963
- 77BookThe Man To See: Edward Bennett Williams Ultimate Insider; Legendary Trial LawyerEvan Thomas — Touchstone — 1992
- 78NewsPisano Witnesses Changing StoriesCharles Grutzner — August 24, 1963
- 79NewsLittle Augie Pisano is Slain With Woman in Auto HereSeptember 26, 1959
- 80BookThe Mafia EncyclopediaSifkakis
- 81NewsValachi To Tell Of Gang War For PowerG. Milton Kelly — October 1, 1963
- 82BookMafia Wiseguys: The Mob That Took on the FedsRudolf, Robert — SPI Books — 1993
- 83BookThe Everything Mafia Book: True-life accounts of legendary figures, infamous crime families, and nefarious deedsDietche, Scott M. — Adams Media — 2009
- 85NewsHeld Nation in ThrallGrace Litchtenstein — April 4, 1971
- 86NewsBody of Informer, Tied to Concrete, Pulled from BayAugust 25, 1964
- 87NewsMafia kingpin dies while serving timeFebruary 14, 1969
- 88NewsRuled 'Family' of 450. Genovese Dies in Prison at 71. 'Boss of Bosses' of Mafia HereCharles Grutzner — February 16, 1959
- 89BookNaples '44Norman Lewis — Carol & Graf — 1978