Stefano (Stevie Beef) Cannone – In the Shadows No More

Although bouncing around the underworld for decades, with a serious criminal record to prove it, Steve Cannone was generally not known to the general public. But that all changed in 1979 with the sensational gangland execution of mob boss Carmine Galante.

Stefano Giuseppe Cannone - aka “Steve Canone” “Joe Cannon,” “Stevie Beef” - was born on April 8, 1913, (alternately listed as 4/18 or 4/9) at 314 Mott Street, in Lower Manhattan, to Ignazio Cannone and Maria (nee’ Ruffino), who immigrated from Sicily.

Stevie was raised and operated his entire life from the Little Italy section of Lower Manhattan.

Stefano (Stevie Beef) Cannone

After getting married, his wife soon gave birth to a son followed by a daughter, and by the mid-1960s they moved to another, larger apartment at 224 Elizabeth Street on a street of the neighborhood where many fellow Castellammarese resided.

Side Note: He was said to be the blood uncle of Frank and Ignazio (Sonny) Cannone, who were born to Stevie’s brother, also thought to have been a mafioso, in the 1920s in Manhattan, before his brother relocated up to Binghamton, New York, with his wife and young sons.

314 Mott St., Cannone’s home as a boy

The boys later became soldiers in the Bufalino Family under the tutelage of the iconic Castellammarese born, Binghamton-based boss Giuseppe Barbara. At 32 years old, Sonny Cannone was one of the youngest attendees at the infamous 1957 Apalachin Meeting in Upstate New York.

Side Note: Besides being nephews to Steve Cannone, Ignazio and Frank Cannone were also nephews of former Bonanno boss Natale (Joe Diamond) Evola, another iconic leader, and respected old-timer.

Ignazio (Sonny) Cannone

Frank Cannone

He stood at a stocky 5-feet 8-inches tall and weighed 180 pounds. He had thinning dark brown hair turning white, brown eyes, and a roundish face with smooth features.

Not typically a flashy hood, by the 1970s Stevie was nonetheless said to be tooling around in a green 2-door Cadillac Coupe.

Cannone was generally low-keyed and operated his mob career quietly. He repeatedly rose to a hierarchy position as an underboss, and later became the longtime consigliere of the Bonanno clan. Yet, Stevie Beef was never known to be a good earner.

He was put in a hierarchy position by various bosses, but allegedly “held down” as far as his earning abilities went.

By the early 1970s, he had purchased an inexpensive co-op apartment for $4,200 and was residing in a third-floor unit at 299 Pearl Street, Apt # 3-B. The maintenance was said to be $252. monthly.

He also kept another apartment in the 6th Ward off North Moore Street, near the Chinatown and Little Italy border. He was also said to keep a summer home out east at Luther’s Road in Mattituck, Long Island.

FBI # 583480, NYCPD # B-103635

NYSID-0041741J

Early mugshot of Steve Cannone

His NYPD criminal record dates to the 1930s and 1940s, with numerous local arrests for:

1932 - robbery, assault and armed robbery, gun possession (15 years at Elmira)

1934 - disorderly conduct

1934 - vagrancy, suspicious person

1938 - possession of narcotics (4 years at Leavenworth)

1938 - selling narcotics (at Attica Prison)

1938 - Harrison Act (narcotics)

1941 - violating parole at Buffalo, NY (returned for 2 years to Attica)

1967 - contempt of court (30 days)

1968 - civil contempt (30 days)

1970 - criminal contempt of court (30 days)

1980 - criminal contempt (indeterminate jail term)

He also had a lengthy record of “out of state” arrests. Cannone had numerous arrests in Washington, DC, and Kansas City, Missouri, for violation of the Harrison Act, possession and sale of heroin (thrice), and conspiracy to distribute narcotics.

In 1934, and again in 1938, he was sent upstate to Elmira State Reformatory for unspecified convictions, where he served two terms back to back behind bars, until his parole in 1941.

With his prison release in approximately 1941, Cannone managed to go twenty-five years arrest-free. His name wouldn’t come to prominence again until the 1966-1969 internal “Banana War.”

Cannone was then named by informants, hit the newspapers again, and become a target of law enforcement.

It was noted in his FBI files that back in 1967, the FBI decided to try and target Cannone as a candidate for its TE “Top Echelon Informant Program” to see if they could “turn” the mafioso into becoming a rat.

FBI surveillance photo of Cannone

But after interviewing him several times, FBI agents deemed him way too uncooperative for consideration.

Cannone listed his employment for over 30 years as a “piece” presser and dress operator with a salary of $225 weekly, at Annette Contractors Ltd., a dress factory located on the 11th floor of an industrial building in the heart of Manhattan’s garment district at 325 West 38th Street.

He was first identified as a mafia “associate” back in the early 1950s. By the early 1960s, he was documented as an “inducted” member.

During the 1966-1968 period, he was allegedly serving in a capos post for Gaspare Di Gregorio’s administration. And by the 1970s, he was firmly being carried by the FBI as the new Bonanno Family “Consigliere.”

Gaspare Di Gregorio

Stevie was said to have first opened and operated a mob social club on Mulberry Street in the late 1950s era. He later operated out of the Sorrento Social Club along PrinceStreet, between Mott and Elizabeth Streets, near his old boyhood home.

Stevie Cannone was also known to frequent a mobbed-up bar at the corner of Peck Slip and South Streets, along the dock area of New York Harbor in the 4th Ward.

The best information available to authorities had Cannone actively engaged in bookmaking and policy numbers in the old 4th and 6th Ward Districts of Lower Manhattan.

He was also thought to be active behind the scenes operating a small but steady weekly Little Italy-based, alternating card and dice game at his private social club. Shylock loans with a 5% overnight interest charge was typically also offered to those losing players who wanted to stay in the card or dice game.

In this same time period, he was also thought to be active in the garment rackets through his suspected hidden “ownership” of the R. & Z. Dress Company, which later did business as Annette Contractors Ltd. Over the years the business address would move from W. 38th Street, to 119 W. 23rd Street.

Federal investigators also took note that Cannone was closely associated with Lucchese capo Joseph Di Palermo, aka “Joe Beck,” who coincidently was a fellow resident of iconic Elizabeth Street.

Joseph (Joe Beck) Di Palermo

Di Palermo was a notorious thrice convicted narcotics trafficker. So the close relationship between the two mafiosi peaked law enforcement’s radar as to Cannone dabbling in the narcotics trade as well. It was an activity for which he had previous arrests and convictions.

Stevie Cannone lived his entire life in a neighborhood that is considered absolute ground zero for Cosa Nostra in this country, the Mulberry Street section of Manhattan’s Little Italy.

Among his closest and most important underworld associates and buddies included such iconic mafiosi as:

• Joseph (Joe Bananas) Bonanno - An original boss who the borgata was named after. Cannone had a 30-year personal affiliation with Bonanno.

• Gaspare Di Gregorio - A top capo who was later elected boss during the conflict with Joe Bonanno in the mid-1960s. He was the first to elevate Cannone to a hierarchy “position.”

• Carmine (Lilo) Galante - Iconic underboss who rose to power after having served a 20-year sentence. Cannone was a member of the hierarchy during Galante’s tenure.

• Philip (Rusty) Rastelli - Interim boss on several occasions, until finally securing the top spot with Galante’s killing, of which Cannone played a pivotal conspiracy role.

• Nicholas (Nicky Eyeglasses) Marangello - Longtime driver and bodyguard to Joe Bonanno. Later rose to serve as underboss. A Galante intimate, who along with Cannone, operated the infamous Toyland Social Club at 94 Hester Street, which also served as the de facto headquarters of the Bonanno clan.

• Salvatore (Sally Fruits) Ferrugia - Another Queens-based, low-key mafioso and capo. He was another member who was thought to have served as an acting boss for a short duration in the early 1970s.

• Salvatore (Toto) Catalano - A Sicilian-born, Queens-based mafiosi and narcotics kingpin of Pizza Connection fame who later became an underboss.

• Anthony (Tony) Lisi - He was born, raised, and operated on the Lower East Side his entire life. Lisi had the well-earned reputation of a strong-arm man and gunman, prolific thief, and narcotics merchant. He favored Manhattan’s 4th Ward, where he ran a neighborhood tavern that doubled as his den and mob headquarters.

• Alfred (Al Walker) Embarrato - A longtime soldier, waterfront racketeer, and narcotics trafficker.

• Michael (Mimi) Sabella - Near iconic capo of their Mulberry Street crew. An intimate of Galante, who was immediately demoted after Galante’s execution in 1979.

They are but a smattering of the New York mob’s glitterati. And although he himself tried to stay well below the radar, Cannone generally knew and associated with them all.

Dating to the so-called “Banana War” of 1966-1969, Cannone was listed as an important Bonanno member by investigators and was subpoenaed before several grand juries probing the bloodshed of this deadly internal mob civil war.

In fact, on June 6, 1968, Cannone was one of eighteen Bonanno mobsters repeatedly paraded before a Kings County Grand Jury probing the war. He was listed as a “Sciacca” sympathizer, who was in the faction opposed to Joe Bonanno maintaining power.

Steve Cannone outside the grand jury waiting to testify

Others subpoenaed along with him were Joe Bonanno himself, Natale Evola, rebel faction leader Paul Sciacca, and soldiers Steve Menna, Peter Pomaro, Joseph Messina, Pietro Magaddino, Guy Musillo, Jerry and Joe Chilli, Vito Licata, among several others.

Seven of them were later indicted on civil or criminal contempt of court charges for clamming up when questioned or answering in an evasive manner.

These included soldiers Anthony Lisi, Marangello and associate Carmine Castellano. Lisa and Marangello had been jailed several times for at least 60 days and fined $1,000 each for refusing to testify.

Cannone received 30 days civil in jail on June 24, 1969, for contempt. He subsequently received an additional 30 days when hauled before the same grand jury probe a second time.

In 1970, Cannone was again among a gaggle of top hoods subpoenaed to testify before the New Jersey State Crime Commission. They questioned him and Genovese capo Cosmo (Gus) Frasca about their legitimate business interests in the Garden State.

Although he did manage to get his name and photo in local newspapers reporting on underworld happenings several times and was compelled to answer subpoenas from mob grand juries, that’s pretty much as far as those cases went.

But by far the most public exposure that Cannone ever experienced by the media, and his most serious criminal case, was from law enforcement in the immediate aftermath of Carmine (Lilo) Galante’s assassination on a hot, sweltering summer afternoon in July of 1979.

Cannone’s shadowy “stop and go” mob career unwittingly came to a screeching halt once agents of the FBI, New York City Police Homicide Unit, Brooklyn’s Rackets Squad detectives, and a host of other local and federal law enforcement agencies all converged like vultures onto the Galante murder scene.

In the coming weeks, months, and years, Cannone’s photograph and likeness started showing up on prime-time news reports, and various images of his were soon released to the general public.

Surreptitious FBI surveillance films of Cannone and other mafiosi filmed the very day Galante was murdered were later used as evidence before several local and federal investigative grand juries that were seeking indictments of him and several mob associates.

Carnage while dining Al Fresco

Important Side Note: In the very days both just before, and right after, Galante was slain, both Cannone and Marangello traveled together to visit Rusty Rastelli in prison to report and consult with him. This confirmed for investigators that Rastelli was being viewed as the true new boss of the Family, and well as being in on the overall murder conspiracy.

Cannone figured into several major criminal cases, all aimed at solving the Galante murder, not the least of which culminated with the infamous “Commission Case,” personally prosecuted by a then, new young top U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Manhattan named Rudolph Guiliani.

One of the linchpin charges in the lengthy, 15-count indictment was the conspiracy to orchestrate the gangland murder of Galante in order take over control of the Bonanno Family.

Side Note: In 1978, the Bonanno hierarchy back in NYC became very worried by the arrest of former boss Joe Bonanno, as well as the personal papers, writing and documents that Bonanno had seized from his home’s garbage pails by agents of the resident FBI office in Tucson, Arizona, who had started a deep investigation of his current and former activities.

Underboss Nicky Marangello and consigliere Cannone doing a “walk-talk”

It was alleged by mob informants that Steve Cannone was among several former members under Joe Bonanno who were overheard being very worried about what he had written, or what he might have said about his former mafia associates.

Cannone specifically made the statement that “I done a lot of work for him,” and he was concerned because there was no statute of limitations on murder.

In the coming years, all this exposure would bring problems for Cannone. It helped to continuously keep his surname before law enforcement. He was repeatedly subpoenaed to testify before many different grand jury probes because of it.

Cannone hides his face from cameras

An example of this was in March of 1980, eight mobsters were indicted by a Manhattan grand jury on multiple counts of criminal contempt of court after they refused to answer questions about the alleged gangland “contract” murder of Galante. Each contempt count was punishable by up to four years in prison.

The prosecutor made sure to hit “Stevie Beef” with four counts of first-degree criminal contempt.

Besides Cannone, Bonanno capo Nicholas (The Battler) DeStefano, underboss Nicky Marangello, and Gambino figures Lenny DeMaria, Armand Dellacroce, Eddie Lino, and the Palmieri brothers, were among those picked up.

But everything would finally come to a head at 8:30 am sharp, on the morning of June 26, 1985. That's when a team of FBI agents rang Cannone’s front doorbell with a federal RICO warrant for his arrest.

As a courtesy because of his ill health, instead of cuffing his hands in the back of him and placing him in a squad car to haul him back to the MCC - Metropolitan Correctional Center based in Lower Manhattan to await processing - his hands were cuffed in front and he was kept in the company of federal agents while the Assistant United States Attorney, Michael Chertoff, coordinated his bail conditions, if any, with Cannone’s defense attorney, the courts of the SDNY, the Federal Magistrate handling any bond, and Cannone’s personal physician.

Two days later on June 28, a Federal Judge ruled that the very sickly consigliere be confined to his home, with an ankle monitor to track his movements 24/7. After relinquishing his passport, he was kept free on a $500,000 bail package, secured by property.

He, as well as Gambino underboss Aniello Dellacroce, who was also deathly ill with cancer, would each later plead “not guilty” through their respective attorneys.

Side Note: Cannone had several well-documented and serious medical problems. Life-threatening conditions such as a recent triple heart-bypass surgery and a ruptured aorta. These were serious issues to be considered by any judge.

The fifteen count, all-star lineup of the Rico indictment included four LCN bosses, one acting boss, two underbosses, one consigliere, and one soldier. This case was indeed referred to as “The Commission Case.”

As the Bonanno consigliere, Cannone was charged with having participated in all Bonanno Family decisions, and many activities of the “Commission.”

Wiseguys caught on FBI surveillance outside the Toyland Social Club

He was specifically hit with racketeering counts for having approved, and then directed the 1979 murder of his former boss Carmine Galante, and the murders of Lilo’s two dining companions that day; capo Leonardo (Nardo) Coppola and restauranteur and soldier Giuseppe (Joe) Turano.

There were additional counts of bribery and obstruction of Justice for trying to influence potential witnesses, as well as various other overt racketeering counts.

As a Commission member, Bonanno “Consigliere” Stefano Cannone was one of several in Cosa Nostra’s hierarchy responsible for giving the order to kill Galante.

Key evidence of his participation in the murder conspiracy was provided to the jury who heard the case.

The FBI provided film reels taken on the sidewalk in front of the infamous Ravenite Social Club on Mulberry Street of Cannone shaking hands, hugging, and giving congratulatory Continental-styled kisses to top capo Alphonse (Sonny Red) Indelicato and his son, then up and coming soldier Anthony (Bruno) Indelicato, literally minutes after the young mafioso allegedly committed the storied gangland hit inside Joe & Mary’s Restaurant in Bushwick, Brooklyn.

Moments after Galante is hit Bruno and Sonny Red Indelicato report the good news to their consigliere

FBI surveillance of Sonny Red and company reporting to Cannone

On November 19, 1986, guilty verdicts were returned against the leaders of what federal prosecutors had declared was the summit of underworld power in this country.

Men with notorious names like Anthony (Fat Tony) Salerno, (The Snake) Carmine Persico, Anthony (Tony Ducks) Corallo, and Salvatore (Tom Mix) Santora.

They were sent up the river for the rest of their natural lives. Each was sentenced to a whopping 100 years in federal prison, and fined $250,000.

The young mafioso Bruno Indelicato received a “break” of sorts, receiving a mere 40 years behind bars and a $50,000 fine. It technically made him eligible for eventual release, after he served several decades in prison, of course.

Some of the indicted mafiosi didn’t last long enough to even sit through the criminal trial.

For a few of the defendants, the trial results wouldn’t matter anyway.

A good example is Gambino boss Paul Castellano who would be slaughtered in a fabled hit on the streets of Manhattan only months later, in December of 1985.

A second key defendant was Castellano’s longtime underboss Aniello (O’ Neil) Dellacroce, who died of cancer only several weeks before that.

Aniello (O’Neil) Dellacroce

Bonanno boss Philip (Rusty) Rastelli was another defendant severed from the case early on because of serious, life-threatening health issues.

Our man, the venerable Stefano “Stevie Beef” Cannone, would never make the trial date either. He succumbed to the grim reaper, of natural causes because of a faulty ticker, in late 1985.

The shadowy Stefano Cannone died quietly at home at the age of 72 years old.

Until next time...”The Other Guy!”

Stefano (Stevie Beef) Cannone – In the Shadows No More

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Stefano (Stevie Beef) Cannone – In the Shadows No More

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