Steve Ferrigno
Encyclopedia
Stefano "Steve" Ferrigno (May 12, 1900 - November 5, 1930) was a New York
mobster of Sicilian
origin who led an important Italian criminal gang in the 1920s. Ferrigno was assassinated along with Alfred Mineo
during the so-called Castellammarese War
.
and emigrated to the United States
. During the 1910s, the teenaged Ferrigno joined New York's Italian underworld. Ferrigno worked his way up the ranks of the Coney Island
, Brooklyn
based Neapolitan Camorra
crime family led by Pellegrino "Don Grino" Morano
and his top Lieutenant, Alessandro Vollero
, who led the Navy Street Gang. It is not known why Ferrigno, a Sicilian, was affiliated with a Neapolitan
crime group, which in that era was highly unusual. A possible explanation is that Ferrigno grew up in the same Brooklyn neighborhood as the Neapolitans. Steve Ferrigno was the brother of Colombo crime family
street soldier Bartolo (Barioco Bartulucia) Ferrigno, who was active in organized crime during the 1940s and 1950s. He served under the rule of Joseph Magliocco
and was later implicated in drug trafficking and other crimes by government witness Joseph Valachi.
, the self-proclaimed "Boss of Bosses" of the New York Mafia. Ferrigno was deeply involved in bootlegging
, the most lucrative criminal activity during the Prohibition
era, as well as illegal gambling, extortion
, and prostitution
. Labor racketeering became a profitable for all the Italian crime groups in New York. The D'Aquino family's access to the Brooklyn waterfront allowed Ferrigno and his associates to engage in cargo theft, extortion of the dockworkers, and exercise control over the longshoremen's unions.
Mafia Boss Giuseppe "Joe the Boss" Masseria. Ferrigno and Mineo had been business associates and allies of Masseria; it is possible they conspired with him to eliminate D'Aquila so they could become the new gang leaders.
Whatever the exact circumstances, Masseria needed to place loyal supporters in D'Aquila's stead, and he therefore gave his support to Mineo and Ferrigno. In late 1928, Mineo became the boss and Ferrigno the underboss of the old D'Aquila gang. The two men controlled approximately 400 to 500 Mafia soldiers with their most lucrative criminal interests in Brooklyn and Manhattan. After bootlegging, illegal gambling on horse races, numbers rackets, and the Italian lottery were the biggest money makers for the gang. In 1931, this gang was incorporated into the Mangano crime family, later to be called the Gambino crime family
.
led by Salvatore Maranzano
began to challenge the authority of Ferrigno's benefactor, Masseria. Once the conflict known as the Castellammarese War
officially broke out into open warfare by early 1930, there were deaths throughout America's Italian underworld.
, Masseria, and Ferrigno himself.
Maranzano faction members including Joe Profaci
(see below), Nick Capuzzi, Joe Valachi
and a hitman known only as Buster from Chicago
were observing the meeting from an apartment Valachi had rented across the courtyard. According to Valachi, in the night of November 5, 1930, Steve Ferrigno and Al Mineo left the apartment and walked across the courtyard, and the Maranzano men mowed them down with gunfire.
Many organized crime historians and even a former Mafia boss, Joseph Bonanno
dispute Valachi's claim that a top boss such as Joe Profaci
would be directly involved in the assassination of an underworld rival. Masseria was killed in a Coney Island
restaurant in early 1931, and Maranzano was himself killed in September, marking the end of the Castellammarese War. The main beneficiary (and organizer of both hits) was Charlie "Lucky" Luciano, who established himself at the top of the New York Mafia
.
Ferrigno was buried in Calvary Cemetery in Woodside, Queens
.
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
mobster of Sicilian
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
origin who led an important Italian criminal gang in the 1920s. Ferrigno was assassinated along with Alfred Mineo
Alfred Mineo
Alfredo "Al Mineo" Manfredi was a Brooklyn based New York mobster, who headed a strong American Mafia crime family during the Castellammarese War. Mineo's organization would eventually become the present-day Gambino crime family....
during the so-called Castellammarese War
Castellammarese War
The Castellammarese War was a bloody power struggle for control of the Italian-American Mafia between partisans of Joe "The Boss" Masseria and those of Salvatore Maranzano. It was so called because Maranzano was based in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily...
.
Early years
Ferrigno was born in SicilySicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
and emigrated to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. During the 1910s, the teenaged Ferrigno joined New York's Italian underworld. Ferrigno worked his way up the ranks of the Coney Island
Coney Island
Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....
, Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
based Neapolitan Camorra
Camorra
The Camorra is a Mafia-type criminal organization, or secret society, originating in the region of Campania and its capital Naples in Italy. It is one of the oldest and largest criminal organizations in Italy, dating to the 18th century.-Background:...
crime family led by Pellegrino "Don Grino" Morano
Pellegrino Morano
Pellegrino Morano was a leader of the Neapolitan Camorra gangs in Brooklyn, New York. He operated from his Coney Island gang and is considered the American "Grand Master" from roughly 1907-1917.-Background:...
and his top Lieutenant, Alessandro Vollero
Alessandro Vollero
Alessandro Vollero was a New York mobster and a high ranking member of the Brooklyn Camorra crime organization. Vollero served as a lieutenant to gang boss Pellegrino Morano during the Mafia-Camorra War of 1916....
, who led the Navy Street Gang. It is not known why Ferrigno, a Sicilian, was affiliated with a Neapolitan
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
crime group, which in that era was highly unusual. A possible explanation is that Ferrigno grew up in the same Brooklyn neighborhood as the Neapolitans. Steve Ferrigno was the brother of Colombo crime family
Colombo crime family
The Colombo crime family is the youngest of the "Five Families" that dominates organized crime activities in New York City, United States, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the Mafia ....
street soldier Bartolo (Barioco Bartulucia) Ferrigno, who was active in organized crime during the 1940s and 1950s. He served under the rule of Joseph Magliocco
Joseph Magliocco
Joseph Magliocco, also known as "Joe Malayak" was a New York mobster and the boss of the Profaci crime family from 1962 to 1963...
and was later implicated in drug trafficking and other crimes by government witness Joseph Valachi.
Emergence as a crime boss
In the 1920s, Ferrigno was a mid-level leader in the Brooklyn crime family of Salvatore "Tata" D'AquilaSalvatore D'Aquila
Salvatore "Toto" D'Aquila was a New York City mobster from the Mustache Pete-era and the first boss of the Gambino crime family....
, the self-proclaimed "Boss of Bosses" of the New York Mafia. Ferrigno was deeply involved in bootlegging
Rum-running
Rum-running, also known as bootlegging, is the illegal business of transporting alcoholic beverages where such transportation is forbidden by law...
, the most lucrative criminal activity during the Prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
era, as well as illegal gambling, extortion
Extortion
Extortion is a criminal offence which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person, entity, or institution, through coercion. Refraining from doing harm is sometimes euphemistically called protection. Extortion is commonly practiced by organized crime...
, and prostitution
Prostitution
Prostitution is the act or practice of providing sexual services to another person in return for payment. The person who receives payment for sexual services is called a prostitute and the person who receives such services is known by a multitude of terms, including a "john". Prostitution is one of...
. Labor racketeering became a profitable for all the Italian crime groups in New York. The D'Aquino family's access to the Brooklyn waterfront allowed Ferrigno and his associates to engage in cargo theft, extortion of the dockworkers, and exercise control over the longshoremen's unions.
Rise to power
In 1928, D'Aquila was murdered on the orders of rival ManhattanManhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
Mafia Boss Giuseppe "Joe the Boss" Masseria. Ferrigno and Mineo had been business associates and allies of Masseria; it is possible they conspired with him to eliminate D'Aquila so they could become the new gang leaders.
Whatever the exact circumstances, Masseria needed to place loyal supporters in D'Aquila's stead, and he therefore gave his support to Mineo and Ferrigno. In late 1928, Mineo became the boss and Ferrigno the underboss of the old D'Aquila gang. The two men controlled approximately 400 to 500 Mafia soldiers with their most lucrative criminal interests in Brooklyn and Manhattan. After bootlegging, illegal gambling on horse races, numbers rackets, and the Italian lottery were the biggest money makers for the gang. In 1931, this gang was incorporated into the Mangano crime family, later to be called the Gambino crime family
Gambino crime family
The Gambino crime family is one of the "Five Families" that dominates organized crime activities in New York City, United States, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the Mafia . The group is named after Carlo Gambino, boss of the family at the time of the McClellan hearings in 1963...
.
Castellammarese War
While Ferrigno ran his criminal activities, a group of Sicilian mafiosi from Castellammare del GolfoCastellammare del Golfo
Castellammare del Golfo is a town and comune in the Trapani Province of Sicily. The name is roughly translated "Sea- Fortress of the Gulf", deriving from the medieval fortress in the harbor...
led by Salvatore Maranzano
Salvatore Maranzano
Salvatore Maranzano was an organized crime figure from the town of Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, and an early Cosa Nostra boss in the United States. He instigated the Castellammarese War to seize control of the American Mafia operations, and briefly became the Mafia's "Boss of Bosses"...
began to challenge the authority of Ferrigno's benefactor, Masseria. Once the conflict known as the Castellammarese War
Castellammarese War
The Castellammarese War was a bloody power struggle for control of the Italian-American Mafia between partisans of Joe "The Boss" Masseria and those of Salvatore Maranzano. It was so called because Maranzano was based in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily...
officially broke out into open warfare by early 1930, there were deaths throughout America's Italian underworld.
Assassination
On November 4, 1930, a meeting of Masseria supporters was held in Ferrigno's Bronx apartment at 759 Pelham Parkway South. In attendance were believed to be a number of top Masseria and Mineo crime family members, including Mineo, Charlie "Lucky" Luciano, Vito GenoveseVito Genovese
Vito "Don Vito" Genovese was an Italian mafioso who rose to power in America during the Castellammarese War to later become leader of the Genovese crime family. Genovese served as mentor to future mob boss Vincent "The Chin" Gigante...
, Masseria, and Ferrigno himself.
Maranzano faction members including Joe Profaci
Joe Profaci
Giuseppe "Joe" Profaci was a New York La Cosa Nostra boss who was the founder of what is today known as the Colombo crime family. Established in 1928, this was the last of the Five Families to be organized. He was the family's boss for over three decades.-Family ties:Profaci's sons were Frank...
(see below), Nick Capuzzi, Joe Valachi
Joe Valachi
Joseph "Joe Cargo" Valachi , Italian American, also known as "Charles Chanbano" and "Anthony Sorge" was the first Mafia member to publicly acknowledge the existence of the Mafia. He is also the person who made Cosa Nostra a household name.-Career:Joseph Valachi was born in East Harlem, New York...
and a hitman known only as Buster from Chicago
Buster from Chicago
Buster from Chicago was a pseudonym used for a mobster and freelance hitman of the 1930s. He is alleged to have played a key role in the Castellammarese War as the assassin of Giuseppe Morello and others...
were observing the meeting from an apartment Valachi had rented across the courtyard. According to Valachi, in the night of November 5, 1930, Steve Ferrigno and Al Mineo left the apartment and walked across the courtyard, and the Maranzano men mowed them down with gunfire.
Many organized crime historians and even a former Mafia boss, Joseph Bonanno
Joseph Bonanno
Joseph Charles Bonanno, Sr. was a Sicilian-born American mafioso who became the boss of the Bonanno crime family. He was nicknamed "Joe Bananas," a name he despised.-Early life:...
dispute Valachi's claim that a top boss such as Joe Profaci
Joe Profaci
Giuseppe "Joe" Profaci was a New York La Cosa Nostra boss who was the founder of what is today known as the Colombo crime family. Established in 1928, this was the last of the Five Families to be organized. He was the family's boss for over three decades.-Family ties:Profaci's sons were Frank...
would be directly involved in the assassination of an underworld rival. Masseria was killed in a Coney Island
Coney Island
Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....
restaurant in early 1931, and Maranzano was himself killed in September, marking the end of the Castellammarese War. The main beneficiary (and organizer of both hits) was Charlie "Lucky" Luciano, who established himself at the top of the New York Mafia
Mafia
The Mafia is a criminal syndicate that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering...
.
Ferrigno was buried in Calvary Cemetery in Woodside, Queens
Woodside, Queens
Woodside is a neighborhood in the western portion of the New York City borough of Queens. It is bordered on the south by Maspeth, on the north by Astoria, on the west by Sunnyside and on the east by Elmhurst and Jackson Heights. Some areas are widely residential and very quiet, while others are...
.
Further reading
- Peterson, Robert W. Crime & the American Response. New York: Facts on File, 1973. ISBN 0-871-96227-6
- United States. Congress. Senate. Government Operations Committee. Organized Crime and Illicit Traffic in Narcotics. Washington, D.C., 1964. http://books.google.com/books?vid=0OdH1cYshmaUKIwnrrmXwrn&id=yxJMaa3f3cEC&q=%22Steve+Ferrigno%22&dq=%22Steve+Ferrigno%22&pgis=1