Joseph (Joe Yak) Yacovelli

Joe Yacovelli was a low-profile but ruthless mob figure whose career spanned decades, from boyhood friendships in Little Italy to leadership in the Colombo family.

Known for his savvy in evading law enforcement and a knack for survival in the violent world of mob politics, Yacovelli’s name first hit headlines after the infamous 1972 Gallo murder.

As acting boss, he steered his path through gang wars, FBI investigations, and power struggles, but one misstep cost him everything, leading to his quiet retreat from the underworld he once ruled.

Joseph (Joe Yak) Yacovelli -- aka Joe the Yak Joe Yack, Joseph Yacobelli, Joseph Yocovelli, Anthony Perelli, and Giuseppe Iacovelli (TN) -- was born in Manhattan’s Little Italy area on January 4, 1928.

His parents, Richard and Elsie Yacovelli (nee’ Arcieri), raised their four children (sons Michael, Joe, Frank, and daughter Anselina) in the immediate neighborhood of 151 Mott Street.

Joe Yacovelli

This was his boyhood neighborhood growing up and the area he would hang around for the rest of his life. As a youth, his family resided in a walk-up apartment on Elizabeth Street.

Years later, he moved to a second-floor unit at 168 Mulberry Street, Apt # 2-C, where he kept an apartment for many years to come. He typically operated out of a storefront social club at 91 Mulberry Street, a few doors down off Broome Street.

By 1971, he operated a private social club on Kenmare Street, where the FBI regularly surveilled visiting Colombo crew members.

He lived in the same apartment, unit #2B, and building as Genovese soldier Vincent (Jimmy Red) Caserta at 168 Mulberry Street. They allegedly lived together for years and split the paltry rent of $53.73 per month.

By the mid-1960s, as an already established middle-aged mafia member, he relocated to Norwood, New Jersey. He listed his address as 400 Piedmont Road, Norwood, New Jersey, a two-acre residence complete with riding stables and several horses.

This was actually the home where both his brother, Michael Yacovelli, and their elderly mother, Elsie, lived.

But he still always kept an extra apartment available back in Little Italy for those late nights when he was out partying and didn’t wanna take the long drive over the bridge back to Jersey. As a confirmed bachelor, it was nice to have an extra place for a quick jump in the hay or to hang his hat.

As far as his personal life went, people say that Yacovelli was never married, nor did he even maintain a steady girlfriend through the years.

Instead, he was known to frequent prostitutes, changing them regularly. He kept it light and easy, with no emotional ties to anyone.

He liked to frequent the Pompeii Restaurant on 57th Street and 8th Avenue, the iconic Patrissy’s Ristorante on Kenmare Street, and a Chinese restaurant named Lucy Jung’s on Canal Street, both in Manhattan.

FBI # 4321436, NYCPD # B-231835, NYS-SID # 0208842Z, KG # 4731

Yacovelli’s New York City police record started in 1945. It listed 15 arrests and several minor convictions. He was later convicted of one felony but was never jailed.

1945 - burglary (probation)

1946 - burglary, grand larceny

1946 - selective service investigation, no registration card

1952 - forgery

1953 - burglary

1960 - burglary, grand larceny

1960 - grand larceny (2 counts)

1961 - consorting with known criminals, bookmaking

1961 - disorderly conduct

1963 - gun possession

1973 - vagrancy

1974 - vagrancy

1974 - unlawful flight, conspiracy

1974 - conspiracy to cross state lines to avoid prosecution in a murder conspiracy

1984 - criminal contempt of court

He stood approximately 5 feet 8 inches tall and weighed 190 pounds. He had thinning dark brown hair and a medium complexion.

Joe Yak was described as short and stocky, with hair combed back flat against his head. He sported a bit of a prominent aquiline nose and had an almost studious look to him in photographs. Yacovelli also had multiple tattoos on both his arms.

It was said that his brother Frankie Yak was also associated with the neighborhood mob.

Although he had boyhood buddies from each of New York’s Five Families, he affiliated early on with the Joseph Profaci Family becoming a “made” member by the mid-1950s.

An Infamous Gangland Killing

For years, Yacovelli was a low-key, little-known member until the Crazy Joe Gallo murder in 1972. From then on, He became a prominent name in law enforcement circles.

A top law enforcement official who knew Yacovelli once described him as “ruthless and extremely dangerous.”

Gallo’s infamous gangland killing at Umberto’s Clam House in Little Italy would elevate Joe Yacovelli’s surname to front-page prominence in the daily tabloids across the country.

The murder was high-profile and intensely investigated and among several names that quickly surfaced as prime suspects as the shooters and getaway drivers were future Colombo soldiers Philip (Fat Foongy) Gambino, Frank (Cisco), and Benny (The Sidge) Locicero, Genovese associate Carmine (Sonny Pinto) DeBiase, and Yak’s chauffeur-bodyguard Joseph (Joe Pesh) Luparelli as the men who went on the actual hit.

Acting boss/consigliere Joe Yacovelli and top capo Vinny Aloi were named as having green-lighted the hit in the wee hours of 4:30 am that morning.

Joe Gallo shot dead.

Almost immediately after the murder, Yacovelli and DeBiase went “on the lam,” making themselves scarce for the next two years while federal and local investigators searched for them about the Gallo homicide.

They each became “Top Ten Fugitives” on the FBI’s Most Wanted List.

Yacovelli was suspected of hiding out in Nyack, Upstate New York, and in New Haven, Connecticut, where the Colombo Family was known to have connections.

At one time, Carmine DeBiase was thought to have been hiding in Plattsburgh, New York, near the Canadian border.

When Yak suddenly reappeared, he turned himself into the police at a public radio station, WINS News, in a special arrangement made by his defense lawyer. He was immediately held as a material witness.

Side Note: Sonny Pinto never surfaced again. It’s been decades without seeing hide nor hair of him. So, it’s a safe assumption that he either died of natural causes while “on the lam,” or he was hit in the head and buried to eliminate any loose ends.

Yak would face several Manhattan, Kings County, and Federal grand juries probing the gang war, and he was later charged with contempt. Capo Vinny Aloi, who later rose to “acting boss” himself, was likewise hit with perjury for lying with his answers.

Sonny Pinto

Yacovelli was also later charged by Denis Dillion’s Eastern District Strike Force with an “unlawful flight to avoid prosecution-murder and conspiracy.” He was released on a $25,000 bail. He later beat this case.

In August of 1972, there was a major attempt by Albert Gallo and the remnants of the Gallo Gang to strike back at Joe Gallo’s killers. They sent a hired killer into a midtown restaurant named The Neopolitan Noodle and gunned down a table of diners who he thought included Alphonse Persico, Jerry Langella, and Joe Yacovelli.

But it turned out that it wasn’t them at all, just four innocent Jewish businessmen out for a quiet dinner together...it was a slaughter that highlighted the gangland violence of the Colombo-Gallo War, and it led to an unprecedented crackdown of Cosa Nostra.

It was later said that Yacovelli was in the parking lot approaching the restaurant for that meeting when he was waved off by associates who warned him of the killings that took place inside only moments before.

Nothing would eventually come out of the Gallo murder investigation as far as Yacovelli went.

Acting Boss

But as of September of 1971, law enforcement authorities had started naming “Joe Yak” as the new “Acting Boss” of the Colombos. For over a decade already, the low-key Yacovelli had been carried as a “captain” on various Justice Department charts.

Yacovelli’s advantage was that in his long underworld career, he was either smart enough, lucky enough, or both to keep his lengthy police record largely unscathed of serious convictions or imprisonment.

Digressing a bit to his earlier history, he was a prolific thief and heist guy. Yet, with the exception of a 1945 burglary arrest for which he later pled out to a reduced charge of unlawful entry and received a suspended sentence, nearly all his other arrests amounted to similar “no jail” sentences.

Joe Yak

After his formal induction as a soldier in the 1950s, Joe Yak generally operated in Lower Manhattan as a member of a small neighborhood regime.

The Profaci/Colombo Family generally did not have a huge membership in Lower Manhattan. Yacovelli became one of only a handful of their members living and operating in Little Italy.

In 1966, informant Greg Scarpa said boss Joe Colombo elevated Joe Yak to serve as a “capo di decide,” taking over a Brooklyn-based regime. He later absorbed all New Jersey-based members as well.

After he turned informant in 1972, Yacovelli associate Joe Luparelli stated that Joe Yak generally didn’t like or trust other “made guys.”

He much preferred to hang around his old boyhood friends from Little Italy, whom he trusted more, forming his own little “clique” with them.

Among these boyhood friends and young street associates were the following names of his closest running mates:

Vincent (Jimmy Jones) Potenza

Carmine (Sonny Pinto) De Biase

Anthony Mangine

Louis (Louie the Priest) Musto

James Longordo

Joseph (Joe Pesh) Luparelli

Paul Monte

Salvatore (Jimmy) DePietro

Salvatore (Sally Bozo) Fusco

Anthony (Fatty) Russo

Alfred (Iggy) Guido

Vincent (Jimmy Red) Caserta Sr.

During the early 1970s, Fusco, in particular, was one of Yacovelli’s closer associates, serving as a daily driver, bodyguard, and aide. At the time, Fusco was a mob recruit, and his assignment was to stick close to Yak and follow directions. Luparelli became another steady driver and aide to Yak.

Although at one time he did indeed own a 1963 Chevy Impala and later a 1966 Oldsmobile Delta 88, Yacovelli was not known to generally drive himself. He often didn’t even own a car. Over the years, he utilized a steady stream of associates to chauffeur him around town as required.

Each of his boyhood associates from Little Italy was known as a top heistman, burglar, and thief. Together with Yak, these men were deeply engaged in many profitable theft schemes over the years.

One racket, in particular, was a luxury automobile theft ring. They focused on stealing, disposing, and preparing fictitious registrations and bills of sale for stolen Cadillacs on a steady basis for several years.

One informant reported that DePietro and Yacovelli had worked together since 1951, stating that they had sold at least 15 to 20 Cadillacs for between $1200 and $1800 each.

In October of 1952, the informer said that this same bunch of hoodlums had stolen $428,700 in precious diamonds and jewelry in a theft from Mrs. Stanton D. Sanson in Manhattan in January 1950.

A Prolific Burglar and Heistman

At his core, Yacovelli was a prolific burglar and heistman, as can be readily seen from his police record.

In those years, Yacovelli partnered with them in high-end burglaries, jewel heists, truck hijackings, armed robberies, stolen credit card rackets, various frauds, scams, and stock and securities thefts.

Over the years, Joe Yak was also known to be active in shylocking, numbers, counterfeiting, strong-arm extortion, and “fencing” truckloads of stolen goods.

By all accounts, Joe Yak was a well-rounded hood who kept his eyes open for any and all opportunities to “earn” on the streets of New York.

In 1967, he was said to have also held an interest in an unlicensed after-hours club called the Cafe Expresso they operated for a while at 178 Mulberry Street, a few doors down from his apartment.

In 1967, mob informant Greg Scarpa reported that Yacovelli was operating a big-stakes floating blackjack game run from a series of Manhattan hotel rooms. He allegedly inherited the game from deceased soldier Patsy Guariglia.

Greg Scarpa Sr.

Also in 1967, regime soldier Benjamin (Benny the Sidge) LoCicero and Yak were partners in a lively floating crap game that was run nightly for over a year out of apartments on the Lower East Side.

A usually reliable informant once told his FBI handlers that many years ago, Yacovelli was even active with the Genovese Family’s Dominick (Fat Dom) Alongi and Vincent (Chin) Gigante in local narcotics trafficking.

It was also documented by the FBI that in 1967, a Gambino soldier named Frank Bongiorno, aka “Frankie Brown,” had sold 12 stolen revolvers to Yacovelli. It was thought that Joe Yak had been stockpiling firearms in anticipation of future gangland violence.

Joe Pesh Luparelli later said that they regularly received stolen .32 and .38 caliber revolvers, oil-laden and still in their boxes, direct from shipments stolen off the Lower West Side docks.

Joe Yacovelli was indeed recognized as a top gunman for the Colombo Family. And this was in a Family well known for having many deadly gunmen. He was respected as a no-nonsense hoodlum.

He rubbed shoulders and was close with other Little Italy-based hoodlums, such as Joseph (Joe Black) Gorgone, Philip (Fat Foongy) Gambino, John (Johnny Irish) Matera, and a few others who also mobbed up with the Profacis.

In later years, Yak proposed Gambino and Gorgone, inducted them, and placed them in Yacovelli’s regime. Foongy was known to operate a retail fish store named Vince’s Fish along Mulberry Street.

It was also said that John Cutrone had been very close to Yacovelli at one time -- so much so that Yak allegedly “sponsored” Cutrone’s Mafia induction in 1955 or 1956.

With capo Joseph Colombo’s ascension to boss in 1964, informants stated that Joe Yak was placed into the personal regime of Colombo himself.

He became one of approximately 20 such “soldati” serving in what could arguably be considered Colombo’s personal “palace guard.”

Some of the other notables in this regime include;

Carmine (The Snake) Persico

Anthony Peraino

Anthony (Abby Shots) Abbatemarco

Thomas DeBella

John (Mooney) Cutrone

Lawrence Gallo

Michael Savino

Antonio Magliocco

Ambrose Magliocco

Salvatore (Sam) Badalamenti

Charles (The Sidge) LoCicero

Rocco Miraglia

Salvatore Profaci Sr.

Anthony (Tony Long) Ricciardo

Modesto (Duke) Santora

Ralph (Whitey) Tropiano

Nicholas Bianco

Joe Yacovelli was soon recognized as an up-and-comer. By 1966-67, federal authorities were carrying Joe Yak as the newly appointed “skipper” of another established Colombo regime based in New Jersey, headed by a Sicilian-born capo named Salvatore (Tutti) Lombardino Sr.

Because Yacovelli had relocated to the Garden State, he was later elevated to head that crew. But he was still a near-daily visitor to Little Italy, which was where his true base of power always resided.

A "Worker"

By all accounts, Yacovelli was known as a “worker” who had notched more than a few marks on his belt in gangland murders over the years.

One well-known incident was what he did to a few fellows who had the temerity to assault and torture his brother Frankie while attempting to shake him down for money.

They kidnapped Frankie and brought him to an apartment where they beat him, burned him with cigarettes, and abused him.

Joe Yak was incensed and immediately demanded that his men find and bring these miscreants to him. One guy they identified was Joseph (Joe Wagon Wheels) Viscovi, an independent racketeer who operated in midtown.

Joe Luparelli knew Viscovi and was able to lure him down to an Elizabeth Street apartment under the guise of selling him stolen traveler's checks. But waiting for them in that apartment was Yak, Sonny Pinto, future Bonanno soldiers Sonny Red and his brother JB Indelicato, Joe Pesh, Anthony (Blackie) Calabro, and several others.

They beat Viscovi mercilessly. Yak repeatedly stuck him with an ice-pick so hard that it actually lodged in Viscovi’s spine. He eventually yanked it out, and he and Sonny Red ended up strangling him to death right in the apartment. Then they transported the body to the trunk of a car, driving it to a viaduct and leaving it there.

After a few days, when nobody came calling about the missing Viscovi, Joe Yak had his men retrieve the body and bury it after chopping off his head and hands to eliminate any identification of the body should it ever be discovered.

Joe Yacovelli

A second assailant of Frankie Yak was alleged to be a hood with the unlikely name of Stanley “The Doctor” Ackerman.

Joe Yak and his minions clipped Ackerman, too. But try as they might, Joe Yak and his buddies never did catch up to Viscovi’s other partner in the Frankie Yak assault.

But the “Joe Wagon Wheels” scenario was not the only “work” that Yacovelli performed during his long mob career. All in all, he was a very busy worker bee for the Colombo borgata over the years.

He was also said to have performed several pieces of work during the first Gallo-Profaci War of 1961-1963.

He and his buddy Sonny Pinto allegedly collaborated on at least one other murder. That of Gallo gang associate and gunsel Ali Hassan “Ali Baba” Waffa.

During the height of the gang war in July of 63’, they stalked their man to the Jersey docks and caught him disembarking a ship that had just docked at the pier. Joe Yack shot Ali Baba repeatedly in the chest and neck as the longshoreman strolled down the gangplank.

He quickly jumped in a getaway car driven by Pinto, and the two killers casually drove back to Mulberry Street to enjoy some clams and shrimp balls at Vincent’s Clam Bar while they discussed their good fortune at having caught Waffa cold.

Side Note: By my count, that makes three on the hit parade for Yak and Pinto: Viscovi, Waffa, and Gallo. But I’m sure they clipped a few other guys together as well.

New York homicide detectives also questioned Yacovelli as a prime suspect in the murder of a hood named Richard Chaisson, who was shot dead in the rear of a midtown tavern one evening before closing time.

By the late 1960s, he was listing employment with Cord’s Garment Delivery Service at 456 Ninth Avenue, where Yacovelli purportedly held the position of a $100 per week truck “spotter. " He was given a company car, a 1970 black Buick Electra 225.

A spotter maintains truck routing and checks for shipment thefts. The company picked the right guy for the job. Yacovelli certainly knew all the ins and outs about truck heists and thefts.

Side Note: Joe Yak, like many other mafiosi in the Colombo Family and other borgata, was engaged in garment rackets.

Although Yacovelli was never business-oriented per se, in 1972, he partnered with Genovese figure and narcotics merchant James (Jimmy Rush) Picarelli in the Commerce Paper Stock Co., a waste paper business that became very successful.

They were later bought out in a court settlement by the original owner of the company.

After serving through the years alternately as an associate, soldier, capo, consigliere, and ultimately the “acting boss” position directly after the assassination of Joe Colombo at the Italian-American Unity Day Rally at Columbus Circle in 1971, Joe Yak successfully navigated the treacherous underworld currents to emerge largely unscathed.

But nobody’s perfect. Yacovelli was about to make a major mafia miscalculation, a career-changing mistake.

A Career-Changing Mistake

In approximately early 1977, he joined with veteran stalwarts Anthony (Abby Shots) Abbatemarco, who was then serving as underboss, soldier Salvatore (Sally Boy) Albanese, and several other key members to challenge current acting boss Tommy DeBella and top capo Carmine (The Snake) Persico, who was the real power behind DeBella.

Joe Yak, Abby Shots, Sally Boy, and the others attempted a major coup to wrest control of the Colombo Family leadership from DeBella and Persico.

After some quiet rumblings and a rough undercurrent from the troops, a high-level meeting was scheduled between the factions. It was said to have been a Commission-ordered “table.” It was requested so that peace would be maintained within the delicate hierarchy of New York’s five mafia factions.

It was to be an internal Colombo Family meeting but Yacovelli and Abbatemarco did not attend the sitdown. Each had a bad gut feeling about the meeting and chose to stay away that day and be a “no-show.”

Top soldier Salvatore Albanese made the fateful decision to “go in” and attend the meeting.”Sally Boy was never seen again. It was 1977. I don’t think he is coming back anytime soon.

Yacovelli, Abbatemarco, Vinny Aloi, and several other Borgata powers then disappeared into thin air. They no longer lived at their homes and were not accessible at their places of business, hangouts, or usual haunts for months thereafter.

They basically went on the lam, lying low to learn about the underworld landscape and Persico’s next moves.

Joseph (Joe Yak) Yacovelli

Allie Boy and his brother Junior Persico had seized power. They looked to quell any dissenters and put down any insurrection by decree or force as was required.

And knowing Persico as they did, the rebels knew they were in for a bloody gang war if they went toe-to-toe against the powerful Persico regime, which was probably the largest and most deadly in the family at that point in time.

Well, “The Commission” stepped in to try and avoid any more bloodshed as well as another major New York City gangland war. Both factions appealed to the body of Cosa Nostra bosses who oversaw all organized crime in this country.

The Commission finally intervened in the conflict and ruled in favor of DeBella and Persico.

Abbatemarco and Yacovelli were soon “officially” demoted in rank and broken back down to soldier. From this point forward, although no outward violence would be directed against them, Joe Yak and Abby Shots were essentially “put on the shelf” and banished from Cosa Nostra.

They became “persona non grata.”

Alphonse (Allie Boy) Persico assumed Yacovelli’s former position and was soon installed as the “official” consigliere. It was the precursor to his brother Carmine Persico being installed as the official “boss” of the Colombo Family.

Joe Yak and Abby Shots each gradually retired from “the life” and quietly lived the remainder of their days away from borgata activities.

Neither man remained a “power” or even a player in the mob landscape.

But considering Sally Albanese’s fate, it was a merciful decision and a benign ending, considering what the alternative could have been.

Some seven years later, in September of 1985, Joe Yacovelli was held on a charge of contempt of court for allegedly giving evasive answers during his testimony before an investigative New York County grand jury which again probed gambling and shylock rackets operating out of yet another Little Italy social club.

Just like the lyrics from that famous 1960s Sonny & Cher song goes...”And the beat goes on, and the beat goes on!”

Joseph (Joe Yak) Yacovelli died on April 28, 2006. He was 78 years old.

Until next time...”The Other Guy!”

Joe Yacovelli on Mob Fireside Chat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzFU04yomV0

Joseph (Joe Yak) Yacovelli

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