This is part four of a five-part series on Cosa Nostra and its infiltration into Long Island, New York.
Aside from the steady “bread and butter” rackets like gambling and shylocking which served as dependable underworld staples for decades, there were many other less commonly operated rackets that could be considered more of a “specialty” racket trade; sporadic “spur of the moment”-type activities that periodically popped up and were run as the opportunities presented themselves such as counterfeiting United States currency or a specifically targeted big-money heist. Other “specialty” activities such as labor union racketeering or large-scale narcotics were also steady rackets but much less commonly engaged in by the majority of racketeers and mafiosi alike.
Then there were the many ad-hoc “cowboy”-type racket activities and “catch as catch can” criminal activities such as truck hijackings and organized burglary gangs. There were the “criminal receivers” and “fences” who bought and disposed of those hijacked loads and stolen goods through their underworld contacts. There were sophisticated currency counterfeiting operations, opportunistic individual shakedowns and extortions, stolen and counterfeit credit card rings, and any number of other criminal pursuits that knock-around guys worked and operated from time to time as those opportunities arose.
There were of course also a number of more subtle and low-key, white-collar rackets such as intricate business infiltration “bust outs” scams and bankruptcy frauds that bilked suppliers of products and receivables amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars at a shot. There were the sophisticated “cartels” set up to quietly gain monopolistic control over certain key industries such as the private carting and sanitation business in Nassau and Suffolk, or segments of the booming construction industry during Long Island’s growth years.
In the mob’s heyday, there was seemingly no end to the amount of viable and lucrative rackets out there on the streets to operate and earn from. The streets of New York and New Jersey as well as many other towns and cities throughout the United States were truly “paved with gold” for any enterprising young hoodlum or mob associate who was willing (and capable) of rolling up his silk shirt sleeves and pounding the streets in his Italian-imported alligator shoes and partake in such rackets.
These wide-open racket opportunities in earlier decades coupled with the lack of stringent laws on the books and the widespread corruption and bribery of neighborhood police departments and local governments back then only added to the mix. It was the “perfect storm,” so to speak, which allowed the underworld to thrive for many decades. And thrive they did, to the point that in many areas where they operated, the local mob became something of an accepted, second government.
What follows are some examples of each of the criminal racket activities mentioned above, selected instances of racket activity, and some of the various arrests that followed over a forty-year period between the 1950s through 1980s. It shows the reader just how “wide open” and blatantly organized crime was able to operate throughout the New York region during that time.
Bankruptcy Frauds and “Bust-Outs”
One of the more pervasive underworld operations over the years was bankruptcy frauds. Better known in the trade as “bust outs,” done properly, this somewhat sophisticated activity could be an extremely lucrative racket for the operators.
Classic “bust outs” have involved such iconic mafiosi as Point Lookout resident John (Johnny Dio) Dioguardi who was famous, or infamous, for bankrupting a string of kosher wholesale meat firms such as Tel-Aviv Provisions and First National Frankfurter Corporation along with his adopted son, Dominick Dioguardi, and their cousin, Thomas (Tommy Flowers) Plumeri. Or Genovese soldier Joseph (Little Joey) Pagano of East Harlem and Gambino soldier Petey Castellano of Old Westbury, who conspired together back in the early 1960s to bankrupt Murray Meat Packers & Wholesalers Corporation of the Bronx of over $1.2 million dollars in just nine days. There have been many other hoodlums who perpetrated the same types of larcenies, both large and small, on Long Island through the years.
