Because family is at the heart of the Mafia
One of the best-known Italian families in the North Side of Kansas City were the Passantino brothers, who owned a large funeral home on Independence Blvd. The eldest of the brothers was Rosario “Rosie” Passantino. Rosie was a security bondsman with a near-monopoly on bail bonds in Kansas City. Dead or alive, you could count on the Passantino brothers to take care of you.
Anthony "The Old Man" Santaniello of Boston and Albert "Leo" Santaniello of the North Shore are not brothers, but the truth about the Santaniello gangsters in Massachusetts who are close kin is a lot more interesting.
I don’t think evildoers are punished after they die, but the trauma they inflict lives after them, and not only in their victims.
The Colacurcio enterprises operated independently of any other organized crime interest, and relied heavily on corruption for their entry into new territories.
The father of the famous and talented Hollywood actor, Woody Harrelson, was a hit man charged in three Texas murders-for-hire.
Yeast was of vital importance to organized crime during Prohibition, since it was an essential ingredient for the commercial production of alcohol.
New York City Mafia boss Gaetano "Tommy" Reina was born in Corleone in 1888, the son of an unwed mother. Originally, he wasn’t named Gaetano Reina....
The October 1921 murder of Vincent Terranova’s ally, Giuseppe “Diamond Joe” Viserte, is said to be the opening salvo in the Second Mafia War, but three other murders earlier that year were likely calculated attacks on Morello.
What Fratianno disregarded as damaging bias---nepotism---is a feature of the Mafia, not a bug.
Fifty years before the Rizzuto Family wrested control of Montreal from the Violi brothers, the Rizzuto family patriarch was murdered in an unlikely place. The murder of patriarch Vito Rizzuto and a brief history of the Rizzuto and Renda families, 1925-2025.
Mafia Genealogy 