Pietro (Pete Aquilino) DeFeo

Pietro (Pete Aquilino) DeFeo was an old-time Genovese Family capo from Mulberry Street and one of Vito Genovese’s top men for decades. Pete DeFeo was a highly respected Genovese Family capo from Mulberry Street and one of Vito Genovese's top men for decades.

He was old school to the core and had a reputation as a no-nonsense mafioso, a taskmaster who made his soldiers and associates toe the line as far as Cosa Nostra rules and decorum went.

Peter (Petey) DeFeo - aka Pete Aquilino and Peter Anthony DeFeo (TN) - was born in Manhattan on March 4, 1902, to Giovanni (John) and Maria Giovanna (nee’ Coluzzi.) DeFeo was raised, reared, and lived his entire life on the Lower Westside. For a time, he also lived in Brooklyn, but Pete primarily resided at 130 West 12th Street for decades.

Pete DeFeo

DeFeo stood at 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighed a slim 155 pounds. He had a long aquiline nose and was typically always dressed in a formal suit and tie.

He married a local neighborhood girl named Nunziata (Nancy) Aquilino, and they had one child together, a son they named John Gabriel. The Aquilino family also hailed from Lower Manhattan’s Little Italy section and several Aquilinos became mobbed up as well. Philip (Soapy Ross) Aquilino was a mob associate, if not an actual member.

Philip (middle) and Frank (right) Aquilino.

Pete DeFeo owned and operated the very successful Ross Paper Stock Company and Ross Trucking Company. Both firms were located at 151 Mercer Street in Lower Manhattan.

He was a highly respected mafia capo. Old school to the core. He had a reputation as a no-nonsense mafioso, a taskmaster who made his soldiers and associates toe the line as far as Cosa Nostra rules and decorum went.

FBI #2813683 NYCPD # B-253234

DeFeo's name first came to prominence in 1944 when he was named as a suspect in a murder indictment.

A soldier at the time, he was charged along with such Family heavyweights as then Luciano Family underboss Vito Genovese, and DeFeo’s direct superior, an important capo di decina named Michele (Big Mike) Miranda . Other defendants included fellow soldiers Cosmo (Gus) Frasca, George (Georgie Blair) Smurra, and Salvatore (Solly) Zappola.

They were all charged with the 1934 murder of mob associate Ferdinand (The Shadow) Boccia, who was ordered killed after Boccia made the fatal mistake of complaining about being cheated out of his end of a $100,000 swindle they had pulled on a sucker fleeced in a crooked card game.

The case was later thrown out after one of the two prime witnesses against them, Peter LaTempa, was poisoned while in a police holding pen under what was supposed to be protective custody.

The Boccia murder arrests.

Side Note: The other stool pigeon, a notorious informer by the name of Ernest (The Hawk) Rupolo, was later tracked down and massacred by mob assassins in 1964. His bloated torso washed up in Jamaica Bay.

Rupolo had been repeatedly shot, stabbed, and gutted. His corpse was then wrapped in heavy motorcycle chains attached to two cement cinder blocks and dumped into the water. His killers expected him to sink to the bottom. But although they had punctured his lungs, Rupolo’s body gasses still allowed his corpse to eventually surface three weeks after his disappearance. At the time his body was discovered, authorities said that it was a textbook underworld slaying.

In 1966, infamous Colombo member John (Sonny) Franzese and a few of his men went on trial for the Rupolo homicide but were acquitted after the jury returned a “not guilty” verdict.

Although known for being extremely cautious during his underworld career with only one murder arrest up until that point, DeFeo fell again in May of 1968 after he was nabbed in a far-flung federal conspiracy, fraud, and embezzlement case.

He was indicted along with other top members of the Genovese, Lucchese, and Pittsburgh Families in a multimillion-dollar Teamsters Union pension fund loan kickback scheme.

The highly-publicized indictment named as defendants such Cosa Nostra luminaries as New York’s Vincent (Jimmy Doyle) Plumeri, Salvatore (Little Sally) Celembrino, and Edward (Eddie Buff) Lanzieri. Also nabbed were members of Pittsburgh’s LaRocca Family including capos Joe Sica and Gabriel (Kelly) Mannarino as well as the boss himself, Sebastian (John) La Rocca .

But the end result for Pete DeFeo would be much the same as in 1944. He was eventually dismissed from the faulty indictment. He skated away from justice again.

DeFeo's Regime

Among those in DeFeo's regime were several important soldiers. But his closest aide and assistant was arguably soldier Lorenzo (Chappy) Brescio, a respected veteran button man who had once served as the personal bodyguard to Charles (Lucky) Luciano in the 1930s.

Brescio handled several labor unions under Genovese control, including Local # 174 of the New York Butchers and Meat Packers Union (AFL-CIO).

His domination of this local was through the installation of his brother Frank Brescio, who was put in place to serve as the business manager of that local. Another Mulberry Street alumni who was a bit younger but would later become DeFeo’s closest aide was soldier Alexander (Black Alex) Morelli.

By the 1980s, the aging DeFeo was operating out of the Primavera Cafe, a Little Italy-based storefront jointly owned by him and Morelli. “Black Alex” served as his capo’s eyes and ears on the street. Morelli would eventually rise to serve as the crew’s “acting capo” under DeFeo.

Pete DeFeo pushes a cameraman away after grand jury appearance.

DeFeo was said to oversee a large, well-established policy-numbers network operating in the Little Italy and Lower Westside dock areas. He controlled several bookmaking rings active in the area as well.

One of his more publicized endeavors was as a labor racketeer along the waterfront docks on the Westside, where he controlled “sweetheart contracts” and other shakedowns aimed at shipping companies and suppliers on the docks.

He used his influence to land a lucrative contract to haul all the bananas off the New York piers.

Investigators later noted that although their trucks were old and ill-equipped to transport such a tender and easily bruised product as bananas, he assigned Ross Trucking Company the exclusive rights to handle, unload, reload, and transport any and all banana shipments arriving by ship into New York City.

As stated earlier, Ross Trucking was owned by mob associates of the Genovese mob, who also happened to be from the Mulberry Street section of Little Italy and were DeFeo’s close relatives and minions.

Hanging Out with his Subordinates

Among his favorite mob haunts and hangouts was a candy store on Elizabeth Street where you would typically see him standing outside on the corner off Spring Street, leaning on a parking meter chatting with his subordinates.

On some days he’d sit reverse-style on a wooden chair, watching the passing cars out front. Petey often hung out front, holding court with his subordinates on many afternoons.

Another favorite watering hole of his was one of the original neighborhood step-down Italian restaurants along Broome Street called Grotto Azzurra (The Blue Grotto in English.) It offered some of the best Napolitani cuisine in the whole neighborhood.

Patrissey’s was another mouth-watering Napolitani-styled kitchen that served top food. Petey could be found eating there regularly.

Still other favorite Little Italy haunts of his were the Alto-Knights Social Club, a notorious Genovese Family headquarters and meeting place off the corner of Mulberry Street, the Luigi Restaurant, and Progressivo Ristorante. Progressivo was also a favorite of Don Vitone and his sidekick Mike Miranda.

Side Note: At one time, surveilling law enforcement detectives even tried planting listening devices in several parking meters in front of the Elizabeth Street candy store where DeFeo “held court” daily. It was a failed attempt to pick up mob banter and evidence against the aging capo.

DeFeo was also known to hold sway in several construction-related locals such as a Carpenters Union that was active at the Jacob Javits Convention Center on Manhattan’s Westside and The Coliseum.

Pete DeFeo passed away on April 6, 1993, at the ripe old age of 91 years old. He will be remembered as another “original,” who helped govern Cosa Nostra during its earliest days in New York.

Until next time...”The Other Guy!”

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