The Uncanny Ability of Little Gene Giannone

In February 1964, Little Gene Giannone was one of dozens of Lucchese family members from boss Tommy Lucchese himself right on down through the family’s top capos, soldiers, and associates were subpoenaed for their testimony before a special Federal Grand Jury headed up by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Morgenthau.

Eugene (Little Gene) Giannone - aka “Eugenio Pietro Giannone” (TN), “Gene Giannone” and “Eugene Gianonne.” was born in 1910 as the oldest son of four children born to Pietrino (Pete) and Eugenia (Jennie) Giannone. He was named after his mother.

The family settled in those early years in the Corona Heights section of Queens County which at that time was a major stronghold for immigrants hailing from the Southern Calabrian and Sicilian regions of Italy.

As a child and into his young adulthood Gene Giannone had grown up and resided at 95-34 41st Avenue. He later moved to an apartment house on Corona Avenue in the heart of Corona Heights across from William Moore Park.

Initially, named for a local WWII hero and later nicknamed “Spaghetti Park” by local residents, it was a popular small triangular neighborhood park that gained its moniker because of all the Italians that comprised the area at that time. Giannone himself gained his lifelong nickname of “Little Gene” because of his small frame and stature.

“Spaghetti Park” in Corona, Queens

By the early 1940s, Giannone had gotten married to a local girl and they had several children together. By that time, he was also doing well for himself in the rackets so he moved his wife and young kids several miles east into a new development of single and two-family homes then being built in the Whitestone section.

He purchased a two-family brick home at 149-12 22nd Avenue. This is where Giannone would live for the rest of his life.

FBI #972673-D

A Friend of Joe Brown

Digressing back to when he was in his early twenties he had befriended another neighborhood youth by the name of Giuseppe Lucchese, who would later become better known to law enforcement, the daily tabloids, and the underworld itself as “Joe Brown.” He was the kid brother of infamous Mafia boss Gaetano (Tommy Brown) Lucchese.

Joe and Tommy had been born back in the Palermo District of Sicily but had immigrated to the states as young children along with their parents and siblings. They originally settled in the East Harlem neighborhood of Upper Manhattan.

But by the mid-1920s, the family had resettled over the bridge into Queens County. The Lucchese family lived on Northern Boulevard in the Corona section for many years. This is how the two young men first met and later became lifelong friends.

By the late 1930s, he had been arrested for booking horses and the New York City Police Department was listing Giannone as a common gambler. He was added to their Queens “KG” list or known gamblers file for that borough.

By the early 1950s, Giannone was also being recognized as a Lucchese family crime figure. His name was recorded by local law enforcement as serving within that crime borgata as a direct “associate” and top-level aide to Joe Lucchese himself. By 1963, mob songbird Joe Valachi had named Joseph Lucchese as an “official” capodecina or crew captain in his brother’s crime family.

By that point in time, Gene had already been repeatedly mentioned over the years by several local police informants as an underworld figure and a member of the Gaetano Lucchese family.

Two informants in particular, who were given the FBI code numbers of NY T-5 and NY T-6 to protect their true identities, had named various local mafia figures for the feds. NY T-5 and NY T-6 had specifically named Giannone as being a “soldier” serving in that family saying that Little Gene “operated within this network.”

Law enforcement viewed Little Gene as being among a mob cadre of approximately a dozen or so close associates of Joe Brown who had been appointed years earlier by his brother Tommy Brown to serve as “capo” over their Corona neighborhood.

Little Gene the Gambler

Giannone was known to mostly operate as a gambler. Over the years, he was tied to various horse bookmaking and numbers operations they operated in the Corona, Elmhurst, Rego Park, Flushing, and Jackson Heights sections of the borough. He was known to operate several “wire-rooms” where bets were received by telephone for this Lucchese regime.

He mostly associated with other members of their Corona crew. Little Gene’s known criminal associates included Joseph (Joe Narrow) Laratro and Joe’s brother Daniel (Danny Narrow) Laratro; Joe and Tommy’s younger brother James (Jimmy Brown) Lucchese; Frank (Frankie Bell) Campanello; Joseph (Joe Bikini) Brocchini; and Donato (Dempsey) Laietta.

During the 1930s and 1940s, he had been picked up several times on gambling-related charges. For instance, he was once arrested for running a large “horse parlor” that was situated inside an innocuous-looking Corona Avenue storefront. Police raided the establishment and hauled off dozens of patrons from the place charging them with disorderly conduct or vagrancy, or for being “common gamblers.”

In February 1964, “Little Gene” Giannone was one of dozens of Lucchese family members from boss Tommy Lucchese himself right on down through the family’s top capos, soldiers, and associates were subpoenaed for their testimony before a special Federal Grand Jury headed up by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Morgenthau.

Then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy had flown into New York especially for the testimony and to take a good look at Tommy Lucchese and his minions. At the time, the Federal Government was attempting a deep probe of Tommy Lucchese’s crime family.

Gene was in very good company, or very bad company, depending upon your outlook. Among those subpoenaed over the course of a week or so for their testimony was the crime family’s number two man Stefano LaSalle as well as such fellow East Harlem underworld luminaries as James (Jimmy Doyle) Plumeri, Joseph (Joe Palisades) Rosato, Vincent J. Rao, Calogero (Charlie) Rao, Andimo (Tommy Noto) Pappadio, Carmine (Mr. Gribbs) Tramunti, and Anthony (Tony Higgins) Castaldi.

Dozens of lesser mafia figures including many regime soldiers and associates were also called.

An Uncanny Ability

Despite his uncanny ability to avoid scrutiny for most of his life during what was believed to have been a thriving underworld career, this was one of the only times in his life that Little Gene was publicly “outed” in the newspapers as a mafia figure.

Up until that point in time, he had generally operated as a “shadow” and was only known to local police at the nearby 110th Precinct which covered the Corona and Elmhurst areas, the Queens DAs Gambling Squad, and the local people of his Corona neighborhood.

Side Note: Little Gene was such a shadow and had such a scant age-old police record that ButtonGuys was not able to even acquire a photograph of him for this biography. I think it’s a testament to his quiet persona and low keyed operating style through the years.

Although he and all the others subpoenaed appeared before the investigative body several times, Giannone and his friends all cited their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination and clammed up before the committee. Little would come from his appearance, and he remained unscathed.

Through the years, Gene had also appeared before several other local and federal grand juries with the same results.

Eugene (Little Gene) Giannone was believed to have passed away in the late 1960s-early 1970s. Gene had lived a shadowy but profitable life as a gambling racketeer as a pivotal member of their Queens regime…he never served one single day in jail.

Until next time…”The Other Guy”

The Uncanny Ability of Little Gene Giannone

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The Uncanny Ability of Little Gene Giannone

Unlock This Door to the Underworld

Take the Journey!

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