Frank (Bo Peep) Tumillo

Frank Tumillo was a "sleeper" in the Colombo Family active in shylocking and policy. He was also an enforcer allied with John (Sonny) Franzese .

Francesco (Bo Peep) Tumillo - aka Frank, Frank Tummillo, Frank Tumello, and Frank Tummello - was born in 1902 in Italy. He emigrated to the United States and settled in Brooklyn, where he lived for decades.

By the mid-1950s, he had moved, like so many other city dwellers, to the suburbs. He moved into a beautiful split-level home at 3 Greentree Circle in Westbury, Long Island.

Tumillo was a little-known “sleeper” in the old Joseph Profaci Family of Brooklyn.

Frank Tumillo

I believe he was a fully “inducted” soldier. If he was not, then he certainly was a highly-placed close “associate” of some of the top original bosses and members of that borgata.

His activities included shylocking, enforcer, and policy.

Authorities said Frank Tumillo was allied with capo and later underboss John (Sonny) Franzese and veteran Genovese soldier Dominick (Swats Mulligan) Caiffone.

However, he had originally started his underworld career under the auspices and tutelage of Cassandros (Tony the Chief) Bonasera and his partner Giovanni (Johnny Bath Beach) Oddo, two of the biggest public enemies listed by police during the 1930s era in Brooklyn.

He was also a contemporary and intimate with Salvatore (Sally the Sheik) Mussachio and active in the same neighborhood where Joe Magliocco and Profaci lived and operated themselves. So, Tumillo was very much in the center of the Family heartland all his life.

In 1939, he was one of five who figured into one of the biggest indictments of the day for participating in a huge loanshark ring headed by Bonasera and Oddo.

The Kings County D.A. said that this conspiracy preyed on hundreds of victims over the years who had borrowed money from the mafiosi.

As time went by, some of the borrowers fell behind on their loan payments, unable to pay the high “vigorish” (interest) agreed upon, which was reported to be a whopping 20% weekly; the old “five for one” money-lending methods of early gangdom.

That’s when Tumillo and the others would start using threats, beatings, and other forms of terror tactics to collect their money.

Many borrowers were so frightened for their lives that they fled town, using relatives and go-betweens to try and negotiate monetary settlements with the hoodlums.

Eventually, a reported 27 of them would testify before the grand jury for the prosecution, making the arrests possible.

Besides Oddo and Bonasera, Tumillo’s co-defendants included Freddy Amorosa (another Profaci soldier) and associate Joseph (Joe Beck) Backowsky. They would all be convicted after a group plea deal to multiple counts of related usury, coercion, extortion, and conspiracy charges, all of which were misdemeanors.

None would go to jail, paying monetary fines instead.

Despite being involved in the criminal underworld since the 1920s, Frank Tumillo has a limited arrest record, including conspiracy (to commit usury), extortion, attempted extortion, violating banking laws, common gambling, and disorderly conduct (twice).

He had convictions for conspiracy and common gambling and was never jailed.

In his later years, by the 1970s, very little was heard from Frank Tumillo. No dod available.

Until next time..."The Other Guy"

Frank (Bo Peep) Tumillo

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Frank (Bo Peep) Tumillo

Often Imitated. Never Duplicated. Button Guys of The New York Mafia...There's Only One!

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