Joe N. Gallo – Underworld Enigma

It was well-documented by the FBI that Joe N. Gallo made numerous trips over the years to Baltimore on a near-monthly basis, in order to pick up the Family’s proceeds from various bookmaking, dice games, and numbers operations run by top Jewish gamblers under their control.

Joseph Nicholas Gallo - aka Joe N. Gallo - was born on January 8, 1912, in the Italian section of Scranton, Pennsylvania, to Italian-born parents Michael and Francesca (nee Giardina), who originally hailed from Bisacquino, Sicily. He moved to New York City as a young man where he was raised and mostly operated all his life.

Joseph N. Gallo

By the 1950s, an already married Gallo, his wife, and young son would reside at 326 East 34th Street, in the Murray Hill section on the city’s east side.

Side Note: There are sources who say Gallo was actually born in Bessemer, Alabama.

By the late 1960s, the Gallos were documented as relocating to 31-85 Crescent Street in the nearby Long Island City/Astoria section of western Queens.

It was a skip away from their former apartment, right over the 59th Street Bridge back into Manhattan.

31-85 Crescent St., Astoria, Queens

Joe N. Gallo had a medium frame and build, and stood approximately 5-feet 7-inches tall and weighed 150 pounds. Gallo stood out for his full hair of prematurely grey/white hair which he combed back.

He was known for always having a quiet demeanor, and gave off the appearance of a confidant, sharp, and savvy mafioso. He was known to be very intelligent and well-spoken, and a man who was a notoriously fastidious and sharp dresser.

But although low-keyed and quiet, Gallo was alleged to have performed contract killings for the Family in his younger days. In fact, it was alleged that he actually traveled around the country as directed by superiors to “eliminate” enemies.

Among his known activities were a large-scale shylocking business, extortion, and labor union rackets.

But his specialty was industrial racketeering inside Manhattan’s multi-billion dollar garment center. The “rag trade,” as it is commonly referred to, was where Joe Gallo decided to concentrate most of his efforts.

FBI # 2444809, NYSIIS # 1412270K

In the 1950s-1960s, he was also documented as having been a silent partner in various bookmaking and policy-numbers networks in both New York and Baltimore, some of which he controlled on behalf of caporegime Carlo Gambino who, at the time, was one of the most powerful sub-leaders serving under Albert Anastasia.

Albert Anastasia

Over the years, Gallo would either create, buy into, or strong-arm his way into many lucrative garment design houses, and dress factories based in the Westside “garment district” area, where authorities have tied him to no less than two dozen apparel manufacturers, cutting firms, jobbers, and garment contracting factories.

He was so successful that by the 1960s, he was thought to have become a millionaire several times over.

Joe was a full partner in a good half-dozen garment companies that gleaned work from several major Manhattan-based manufacturers, who subcontracted work out to Gallo’s dress factories. It insured a huge built-in profit at year's end, every year, for decades!

I’m sure as boss of the Family, his partner Carlo Gambino received his fair share of garment profits as well.

Don Carlo Gambino

Carlo was also intricately tied to the garment industry through his ironclad control (later passed to his two sons Thomas and Joseph) of an interlocking string of garment trucking firms that were based along Manhattan’s Westside, sprinkled in between the thousands of dress firms, designers and manufacturers.

Each and every one a potential customer for the mob’s garment carriers and haulers.

Side Note: A highly respected member for decades, when Carlo Gambino became boss in 1957 he had appointed Joseph (Joe Bandy) Biondo and Giuseppe (Staten Island Joe) Riccobono to the hierarchy along with him.

But after Riccobono attempted suicide and Biondo was knocked down and demoted, Carlo decided to elevate Gallo to become his consigliere.

It was a position Gallo would hold for nearly thirty years, through three Family administrations, those of Gambino, Castellano, and Gotti.

Equally impressive was that up until a major 1966 police raid (which will be discussed in more detail further into our story), he had previously been a virtual unknown to law enforcement.

Proof of this fact is that his name is not included in several major NYCPD, FBI, and FBN handbooks of the era, which were typically provided to all detectives and federal agents in order to educate them on their potential targets and adversaries.

Nor was he ever named by informer Joe Valachi in his 1963 U.S. Senate Hearing testimony before Congress.

Upon good review of those infamous membership charts that Valachi painstakingly dictated for the U.S. Senate back in those days, Gallo’s name was not listed once under the Anastasia/Gambino Family chart.

So much for the man that only three years later would become the formal “official” consigliere of the entire Gambino borgata. It was a position he’d occupy for the next three decades.

During his long career, Gallo had been very adept at keeping to the shadows. This mafioso, Joe N. Gallo, was indeed an underworld enigma for certain!

By at least the late 1940s, he is thought to have been a soldier serving in the regime of a Bronx-based capo named Rosario Dongarra better known to the bent-nose set as “Charlie Brush.”

At some point, Gallo was elevated to serve as “acting captain” for the Sicilian-born Dongarra.

He would serve in this capacity for years as Charlie Brush’s eyes, ears, and proxy overseeing his crew until Dongarra’s death in 1973 at which time Gallo absorbed some of those soldiers into his personal little “crew.”

Back when he was a young Capodecina, he was assigned to handle various duties, one of which was to oversee Anastasia/Gambino Family operations in the city of Baltimore in Maryland.

The borgata maintained a separate regime there, headed by an old line-capo named Luigi (Lou Mora) Morici.

After his death, control fell to another capable mafioso named Francesco (Frank) Corbi, who with his brothers and nephews would run Baltimore for the Gambino Family for decades.

Gallo had been assigned as the Baltimore crew liaison with the Family hierarchy back in New York City. First under Albert Anastasia, and later under Carlo Gambino.

It was well-documented by the FBI that he made numerous trips over the years to Baltimore on a near-monthly basis, in order to pick up the Family’s proceeds from various bookmaking, dice games, and numbers operations run by top Jewish gamblers under their control.

On more than one occasion Gallo traveled there to try and light a fire under the asses of their resident regime, who ostensibly controlled the city.

Caporegime Joe Gallo felt they weren’t squeezing enough “protection” and “tribute” money from the city’s illegal gambling fraternity.

So, he embarked on a campaign to try and bolster up those light envelopes that were being collected and handed into the complacent Frank Corbi who in turn split the monthly take with Joe Gallo and the hierarchy back home in New York.

Among his closer associates through the years were the brothers Samuel (Butch) and Louis Rumore, who were both soldiers in the Family and ran a Teamsters union local that organized NYC soda manufacturers and distributors.

Another close aide was Anthony (Tony Pepsi) Vitta, a soldier who served Gallo as a close and trusted aide for years.

Other important Gambino members he affiliated with were:

>Iconic mafioso Joseph (Staten Island Joe) Riccobono and later his nephew, Johnny Riccobono.

>Anthony (Big Tony) Vanella - A soldier with a deadly reputation who lived near Joe in Astoria and was also deeply involved in garment district operations when not behind bars.

> Frank (Frankie Dap) Dapolito who also hailed from downtown Manhattan. Dap was a veteran soldier and “acting capo” for his “skipper” Ettore Zappi . A former boxer, he also served for years as a business agent of Teamsters Local #854.

>And, of course, his son Joseph C. Gallo Jr., who was closely associated with his dad’s world from the time he was a youth. As a young man, he was sent to prison in Upstate New York on a drug conviction.

When Joe Jr. was finally paroled as any loving father would, Joe Sr. made sure to “pinch” his son’s finger and set the young man up with a secure business for his future.

Joe N. Gallo got around pretty good.

A favorite passion of his was to bet the ponies, and when they weren’t running then the dogs would do.

In his younger years, he was also known for hitting all the hot nightspots like the famed Copacabana and The Stork Club, both in Midtown. And many a night he could be found front and center having a drink at the bar.

But it wasn’t always fun and games in the mafia either. In his long and very successful career, Gallo would end up facing the news cameras as well as handcuffs on several occasions.

Yet with all the later hoopla, and for all intents and purposes, Joseph N. Gallo enjoyed an extremely low profile as far as the limited law enforcement knowledge on him went.

Gallo in front of an Astoria hangout.

The criminal record that the New York City Police Department had on him was scant at best.

In 1966, at the age of 54 years old, Joe N. Gallo was arrested along with the mob’s top glitterati, while dining at La Stella Ristorante on Queens Boulevard in Rego Park.

They were all nabbed on charges of “consorting with known criminals,” and hauled away in paddy wagon’s in front of dozens of news reporters and cameramen, to the holding cells at the Queens Criminal Court House building also located along Queens Boulevard, for a later arraignment in court before a magistrate who set bail.

This incident started being called the “Little Apalachin Meeting” after the infamous 1957 meeting of top Mafia leaders and their henchmen at boss Giuseppe Barbara’s estate up in Apalachin, New York.

Soon, a grand jury probe was empaneled to investigate the matter. A move that would boost the Queens County District Attorney’s career.

He would face numerous local and federal grand jury probes as a result of his prominence as one of the fifteen most important mobsters of the New York Mafia.

One of only five traditional consiglieri who counseled thousands of mafiosi as a result of his seat on “The Commission.”

Yet, despite all the exposure over the years, it was not until Christmas of 1987 that Joe N. Gallo would really face the music and finally pay the piper for his long underworld career as one of the most important mafiosi in the United States for over a half a century.

After six days of intense deliberations to mull over evidence from a jury trial before Judge Jack B. Weinstein that had started several months before on September 28, the federal jury returned guilty verdicts on racketeering charges and conspiracy as well as extortion, bribery, loansharking, and related counts.

Aging consigliere Joe N. Gallo pinched

What made this case so special for prosecutors was that both the current underboss, as well as the recently retired consigliere, who was a highly respected “elder statesman” of the Family had been nabbed.

Arrested along with Gallo that day back in June of 1986 were 15 other top members and associates including Joseph (Joe Piney) Armone, a longtime top capo and former prolific heroin trafficker.

Capos Joseph (Joe Butch) Corrao, Robert (DeBe) Di Bernardo, James (Jimmy Brown) Failla, Joseph (Joe Z) Zingaro, amid many others.

Many defendants pled out or had their cases severed for a separate trial from that of Gallo and Armone. But brought to trial with them were two close associates of Gallo. His longtime aide, soldier Anthony Vitta, and crew associate Salvatore Migliorisi.

After his conviction, Armone was immediately remanded as a danger to the community, right back to MCC in Manhattan (Metropolitan Correction Center) to await his sentencing. So was Vitta. But Gallo was allowed to remain free under virtual house arrest, pending any appeal of the sentence.

Gallo and Dellacroce exiting court

Gallo was specifically convicted on two bribery counts, and a count of illegal interstate travel to commit bribery. He was acquitted of loansharking.

Gallo and Vitta had been accused of operating a loanshark business. Joe got lucky on this count, but “Tony Pepsi” was convicted of the loansharking.

One of the major bribery charges accused Gallo and Armone of plotting to pay a $20,000 bribe so that Joe Gallo’s son, Joe Jr. would be transferred from a tight security New York State prison, where he was then being held, to a Federal prison where he would receive better treatment and living conditions.

What federal authorities and the FBI thought remarkable was that up until June of 1986, Joe N. Gallo had never been formally charged with any crime.

The wily old mafioso had seen the inside of plenty of police station interrogation rooms, and grand jury rooms as well, but the law had never been able to lay a glove on him....until this conviction!

In Federal court that morning, standing before the judge at 76 years old, the venerable mafioso was sent up the river for ten years. He was also fined $250,000.

Side Note: After a lifetime of protecting himself very well from prosecution while he was active on the streets, Joe Gallo finally fell because of his instincts as a loving father.

He pushed, maybe more than he should have, to do anything possible to try and ease his son's harsh prison conditions inside Attica State Prison.

W ho knows/ Maybe his judgment was temporarily blinded by the love of a father for his son. If so, who could blame him? He loved his boy!

A savvy fox his entire life, the wily Joseph N. Gallo died in 1995, at the comfortable age of 83.

I, for one, consider his underworld career to have been a long and largely successful one. He served no less than three Family bosses, apparently satisfactorily, for close to 30 years. He even filled in as the interim leader between hierarchy successions on several occasions.

And with the one exception where he did face a serious RICO charge, it was largely John Gotti’s hubris, vain, and arrogant operating style that ultimately exposed guys like Gallo to law enforcement’s scrutiny and arrest.

It’s quite possible that Gallo might not have fallen at all, certainly not as hard as he did, if not for the careless acts of others that he tried his best to help with.

Joseph C. Gallo Jr.

He was born on November 6, 1948, in Manhattan. As a youth, his family moved to the L.I City-Astoria area of Queens where he grew up.

Garment racketeer - Joe C. Gallo Jr.

Once married, he and his wife moved to 30 Hunt Court in Jericho, Long Island. They also lived for a while in nearby Oyster Bay.

Activities: garment racketeering, shylocking, narcotics.

As a young 19-year-old, he enrolled in college at the University of Plano in Plano, Texas, in September of 1966. But he lasted less than one year before he chose to drop out and join his father in “the life.”

As a young man, he got nabbed by city narcotics agents for attempting to sell a kilo of heroin. He was convicted and served a long prison term up in Attica State Prison, where he was Inmate #18040, and later transferred to Sing Sing Prison, both in Upstate New York.

He was released from jail in March of 1985 and will be on lifetime parole.

Planning for his son's eventual release from jail, his father set him up in Manhattan’s garment district. Young Joe Gallo Jr. became a principal owner in a large dress factory and was later given the additional responsibility of handling more garment racket activity for the borgata.

It would make young Joe a wealthy man.

The SCI investigation revealed that Joseph C. Gallo owned or controlled five garment-related companies in New Jersey. They are:

> Toni-Linda Productions, Inc. > Randello Enterprises, Inc. > 1040 Grand Street Associates, Ltd. > FLP Distributing Services, Inc. > Railroad Enterprises, Inc.

All of the above companies were based in either Hoboken or Ridgefield, New Jersey.

All five companies are non-union and do garment cutting, warehousing, and shipping. They also brokered sewing work out to various contracting shops in the metropolitan area.

The companies were all run by a close associate of Joseph N. Gallo, Peter Porcelli of Staten Island, and Porcelli's nephew, Leonard Tagliavia of Hoboken. Both of whom have long experience in the garment business.

From 1986 through 1988, these companies received 94 percent of their business from a single Manhattan garment manufacturer, Norton McNaughton of Squire, Incorporated.

Since Norton McNaughton is a New York firm, its records were unavailable for examination and its executives refused to talk with SCI staff. In the mid-'80s,

Norton McNaughton had resisted unionization of its shipping department and the llAJWU struck the company, as well as any contracting firms that it learned, did work for Norton McNaughton.

FBI surveillance pics of Joe Jr.

These labor troubles spilled over and also caused problems for the Gallo companies.

In tracking Norton McNaughton's contractors, the union discovered Toni-Linda and learned that it was also doing work for another company owned by Porcelli. That firm was a unionized garment-cutting business called Kip's Bay Cutting Corporation in Brooklyn.

It was there that young Joseph C. Gallo was employed before he went to federal prison. Upon his release from jail, Gallo went to Toni-Linda and eventually became an owner.

The ILGWU eventually accused Porcelli of "double breasting" by having non-union workers produce goods for a unionized garment company.

In fact, another Gallo company, Randello Enterprises, appears to have been created solely as a vehicle through which to funnel Porcelli's salary from Toni-Linda so as to keep his name off Toni- Linda books and conceal his relationship to this non-union company.

The investigation revealed that 1040 Grand Street Associates Paid $1 million in May 1986, for a building in Hoboken to house Toni-Linda, Norton McNaughton's cutting contractor, as well as other Gallo-controlled enterprises.

The money was raised by a $750,000 bank loan, investments from Porcelli, and advances from Norton McNaughton.

Railroad Enterprises operates a huge garment consolidating warehouse and shipping depot in Ridgefield that stores and warehouses more than 500,000 garments for Norton McNaughton.

Between 1986 and 1988, total revenue for the five Gallo firms was a whopping $12,525,716, of which $11,817,681 came from Norton McNaughton.

During that period, the Gallo family took $781,689 out of the companies, Porcelli, $307,248, and Tagliavia, $360,600.

The investigation found no evidence that any member of the Gallo family invested any of his own money in the companies.

Simultaneous to these events, with his father's sponsorship, Joe Gallo Jr. was also eventually absorbed into the Gambino Family as a “made man.” From this point forward, Joe Gallo Jr. became one of the lowest-profiled soldiers of the New York mafia.

Today, decades later, he is in his early seventies. He lives very comfortably with his wife and children out on Long Island.

He is ostensibly a semi-retired, successful garment industry executive. He is also reportedly well-received in his upscale Nassau County community as a good neighbor and is well-liked.

Joseph C. Gallo has largely been able to avoid any serious legal trouble in recent years.

After a rough start of having served prison time as a young man, it seems Joe Jr. took a page out of his father's book and learned the very important lesson of doing your best to stay off law enforcement’s radar.

Adopting the style of his late father Joe, as well as Family boss Carlo Gambino himself, this quieter approach and operating style to mafia life have apparently served Joe C. Gallo Jr. well through the years....he is yet another important “sleeper” of organized crime.

Until next time...The Other Guy

Joe N. Gallo on Mob Fireside Chat

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Joe N. Gallo – Underworld Enigma

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Joe N. Gallo – Underworld Enigma

Unlock This Door to the Underworld

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You May Also Enjoy

The Gyp DeCarlo Regime Leadership Chart

The Life and Death of Capo Giuseppe (Joe) Scalice

Frank (The Spoon) Cucchiara – “The Cheeseman” of Boston

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