Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro – A Vicious Mob Enforcer

“Vinny Bruno” as he was most commonly known on the gritty streets of New York, was the acknowledged right-hand man to Tony Bender and the young fella that did most of the dirty work. As Bender rose to become underboss, Mauro was said to have become that much more influential on the streets.

Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro was born as Vincenzo Francesco Angelo Mauro (TN) in Manhattan on February 26, 1916. He later lived up in the Bronx at 3824 Bronx Boulevard along with his common-law wife. He also kept an apartment at 22 King Street in Manhattan.

He stood 5-foot 11-inches tall and weighed 200 pounds with dark brown hair and eyes, and bushy eyebrows. His eyes were deep set with dark circles around them.

Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro

A vicious and feared hoodlum and merciless killer. Mauro had a well-earned reputation as one of the Genovese Family’s most dangerous men in the 1950s-1960s era, serving in the regime of capo Antonio (Tony Bender) Strollo.

In fact, it was said that Mauro, along with Innocenzio (Johnny the Bug) Stopelli were Strollo’s two “go-to” men regarding any strong-arm work needed to be performed for himself or Vito Genovese directly. Mauro was also said to have been groomed under Stopelli.

“Vinny Bruno” as he was most commonly known on the gritty streets of New York, was the acknowledged right-hand man to Tony Bender and the young fella that did most of the dirty work. As Bender rose to become underboss, Mauro was said to have become that much more influential on the streets.

He was active in the operation of illegal after-hours nightclubs, gay bars and “fag joints” as they were known, lesbian dens, and other sordid nether world locations throughout the Big Apple. Whether it was actually investing the mob's money into these types of establishments, or just extorting and shaking down the operators of these bars and clubs for a weekly envelope.

Underboss - Antonio Strollo

Another racket that Mauro was known to engage in were various types of prostitution activities.

It was well documented by federal agents who tracked him that he would actually introduce and hand off sexily dressed women in various nightclubs Mauro hung around to men he knew, or patrons he became friendly within these establishments that sort out that kind of thing.

Dave’s Blue Room in Manhattan was said to have been one such establishment. Another location was allegedly The Band Box, also in Manhattan, in partnership with Vito Genovese himself.

He was suspected of also overseeing several houses of prostitution either controlled or extorted by the mob in Manhattan.

Vinny Bruno was also in charge of conducting the shakedowns of homosexual bars, illegal unlicensed after-hours clubs and underground Manhattan sex clubs that catered to a gay and lesbian clientele.

These type of sex-related rackets were mostly dominated by the Genovese Family in general, and the Strollo mob more specifically. And Mauro was among several key Strollo soldiers who oversaw these rackets for their borgata.

In the late 1950s, it was reported through informants that in fact, Vinny Bruno was partners behind the scenes with Lucchese capo Paul (Paulie Ham) Correale in the ownership of another watering hole called The Golden Door Nightclub inside the Barkley Hotel at 49th Street and Park Avenue in Manhattan.

FBI # 760950, NYCPD # B-115392

Mauro’s arrest record started in 1933 and included such charges as:

1933 - possession of burglar tools (suspended sentence)

1934 - robbery (5 to 10 years at Sing Sing)

1940 - parole violation

1942 - selling narcotics

1945 - homicide by gunshot

1948 - narcotics investigation in Baltimore, MD

1955 - income tax evasion (4 months)

1961 - Federal narcotics conspiracy

1962 - jumping a federal bond

1962 - fugitive warrant / later arrested by Interpol in Barcelona, Spain

He was known to be very active in the loan-shark racket, and the subsequent strong-arm methods that went along with it to extract the monies and vigorish that accumulated.

Mauro was also active in various gambling businesses (policy numbers) over the years, but his real “baby” and most lucrative racket was narcotics. Not just any drugs but heroin, and lots of it.

In fact, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (FBN) reported that Mauro had been on their watch list since the early 1940s. He was tracked and recorded meeting with many of the largest international heroin smugglers and wholesale distributors known to exist.

He dealt on a regular basis with top mafiosi and Corsican racketeers on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

Vito Genovese

His underworld friendships and connections ran to the very summit of the Mafia, all the way to Lucky Luciano and Vito Genovese themselves.

On a local distribution level, Mauro was said to use several close trusted associates to disperse wholesale amounts of heroin to various other hoodlums and dealers throughout the five boroughs.

Chief among these was a notorious, Brooklyn-based drug peddler named Giacinto (Archie) Mannarino. Born in 1912 in Calabria, Italy, Mannarino was well known to deal in amounts ranging from an ounce to a kilo of “junk.”

From a social club along Myrtle Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn, Archie would negotiate his drug transactions. Described by federal drug agents as a protege of Mauro and Strollo, he was considered one of several key distributors Mauro used as outlets for his junk loads.

In 1955, the walls closed in on Mannarino. He was convicted in federal court and sent away for 5 years on a narcotics charge.

In May 1961, Vinny Mauro was among 24 charged in two separate indictments for operating a $150 million narcotics ring that imported heroin into the U.S. from Canada and Italy over the span of 10 years. Arrested along with him were fellow soldiers and Strollo regime members Ottilio (Frankie the Bug) Caruso and Salvatore (Sal) Maneri. Joe Valachi and Albert and Vito Agueci were also arrested in this case.

As a side note, this was the case that preceded Joe Valachi turning informant. As for Albert Agueci, this is the case that got him killed after he started making rumblings up the Magaddino Family ladder demanding Stefano Magaddino pay for his defense lawyer and take care of his family while he was imprisoned. It was quite a gruesome death which you can learn more about in our bio on Lupo the Wolf Randaccio .

Mauro, Caruso, and Maneri ended up jumping a $110,000 bail package between them and fled the country that September and an international warrant for their arrests was immediately issued. The three got themselves fake Canadian passports and made their way to the Bahamas. While there, a young Canadian woman vacationing on that sunny island with her friends just happend to noticed these three American men freely throwing money around like it was nothing. When she got back home to Toronto she saw their pictures in the newspaper and immediately called the authorities to tell them what she knew.

Narcotics agents jumped on the tip and started trailing the trio as they traveled from the Bahamas to Jamaica to Caracas, Venezuela, and finally to London. But by that time, the agents had lost the trail.

Authorities eventually captured them in Spain in January 1962 after Italian police became suspicious of a New York businessman named Henry Rubino who would visit with Lucky Luciano in Naples and then disappear. By that time Luciano was living permanently in Naples after he was deported from this country.

Apparently, Rubino, who was also a business partner of Mauro in some New York nightclubs and, unknown to authorities at that time, also a Genovese Family soldier, had set up a place for the trio to hide out in Barcelona. And he was giving them money, too - lots of it. When Mauro was arrested he had $11,730 cash in his pocket. He also had a key to a safe deposit box where authorities found another $43,759 more in cash.

The trio was immediately extradited back to the United States to face the music.

When they arrived at New York's Idlewild Airport (now JFK,) they were met by 45 heavily-armed policemen and federal agents. One was even carrying a submachine gun because authorities had been "tipped" that the three were going to be murdered.

As they were hauled past a waiting horde of reporters, Caruso supposedly told them, "Sure, I jumped bail. What do you think we were doing in Spain?" While Mauro supposedly described the entire fiasco as a "Hollywood show."

Vinny Bruno, Frank Caruso, and Sal Maneri all ended up getting 15-year sentences for the narcotics charges plus an additional 5 years to run concurrently for bail jumping.

As a side note, Italian authorities arrested Rubino on January 25, 1962, just a few days after Mauro and company were arrested and hauled back to the U.S. Lucky Luciano was brought in for questioning the very next day on January 26 and was ordered to return the next day for more questioning. But the next day never came for Luciano because he died of a heart attack at Naples Airport where he had gone to meet a movie producer.

No disposition could be found on Rubino regarding his 1962 arrest in Naples. However, in 1972, Rubino was shot to death on a golf course in Florida by a loanshark customer of his named Michael Mason. Mason was apparently angry that Rubino had made threats against him and his family if he didn't pay back a $2500 loan sooner rather than later.

Another interesting side note: When Mauro was originally arrested in this case back in 1961, he told authorities he was a talent scout for an advertising agency.

And one more interesting side note: John Papalia, also known as Johnny Pops from Hamilton, Ontario, who was at the time only 37 years old, was also convicted in this case. He received a 10-year term. When he was first arrested, he told authorities he was a gambler. Obviously, a gambler who eventually made the big time.

Back in 1945, Mauro was charged with suspicion of homicide for the murder of Rocco Loscalzo who was shot to death in the street as he was entering a Greenwich Village apartment building. Loscalzo was out on bail after being charged with robbing a warehouse of 20 thousand dollars in liquor. Mauro was found hours later wearing blood stained clothing but he denied having anything to do with the murder. His old friend Johnny the Bug Stopelli was also called in as a material witness to the murder. Apparently, Mauro, Stopelli and Loscalzo had previously served time together and loscalzo was last scene alive at a bar Stopelli had a hidden ownership in. Authorities believed that Loscalzo was killed because he was going to turn informant

Eventually, Mauro was freed as there wasn't sufficient evidence to support the charge..

In 1956, he was fined $200 for liquor law violations in the operation of an exclusive high-end after-hours club on the East side called the Gold Key Club which he co-owned with Frank Caruso. It was still in operation even in the 1970s - though at a different location with slightly different rules - when another big raid took place there where many of the bent nose set "members" were arrested and the special gold key was still the key to get in just like in 1956. Think of that golden key like the golden ticket in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

Underworld legend has it that Mauro was one of several hoods, including future Family boss Vincent (The Chin) Gigante, who was involved in planning the botched “hit” on Family boss Frank Costello in the vestibule of his residence at 115 Central Park West in 1957.

In December 1957, Mauro was pulled in for questioning and grilled for three hours about the Albert Anastasia murder before being released.

In 1959, he was at Marino's restaurant in New York enjoying dinner at another table when Little Augie Pisano who was also there dining with friends including Tony Bender strollo received that mysterious phone call and left the restaurant with former Miss New Jersey janice Drake only to be killed shortly thereafter. Supposedly, Tony Bender and Vinny Bruno later left Marino's and headed over to the Copacabana to watch the fights on TV in the club's lounge. BTW, the Bonanno Family's Anthony Mirra who later confessed to the murder was also at Marino's restaurant.

Also in 1959, Mauro supposedly introduced Joe Valachi to doomed Magaddino soldier Albert Agueci who helped Valachi cross the Canadian border when he jumped bail after a narcotics indictment that year for which he was eventually convicted.This conviction by the way was the one that got him sent to Atlanta federal penitentiary where Vito Genovese was jailed which set into motion the events leading up to Valachi becoming an informant.

Innocenzio (Johnny the Bug) Stopelli

Besides Genovese, Strollo, and Stopelli, most often associated with fellow soldiers Pasquale (Paddy Mush) Moccio, Alfred (Butch) Faicco, Joseph (Joe Cago) Valachi, brothers Joseph and Pasquale Pagano, the Bonanno’s Anthony (Tony) Mirra, and the Lucchese mob's John (Big John) Ormento, and Salvatore (Tom Mix) Santora.

After his release from prison on the 1961 narcotics charge, coupled with the subsequent deaths of Strollo in 1962 and Genovese in 1969, Vinny Bruno mostly kept a lower-keyed profile. His salad days in the mob long over, Mauro trudged along as any self-respecting mafioso would do and still showed his face around occasionally, doing his best to maintain his mob persona.

By the way, the FBI reported that had Mauro not been in jail in 1962, he too might have disappeared along with Strollo. It was said that Mauro fell out of favor with Genovese because of that drug bust.

In the late 1970s and early 80s, Vinny Bruno could still be seen weekly at a ringside table in some of the more popular show spots and nightclubs in Midtown Manhattan such as The Drake Hotel off Park Avenue, and the famed Frankie and Johnnies Steakhouse off Broadway in the Theatre district.

But his time in the mafia sun had passed. Most of his contemporaries were either dead, in jail, or long retired in South Florida. He was still respected because of that “button” he earned decades ago, but it was a new up-and-coming generation of hoodlums, and there was little room at the table for the likes of Vinny Bruno.

Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro died in 1994 at the age of 78.

Despite their chosen “professions”, some mafiosi are well-liked and respected, not only by their mob brethren but also by regular folk who have gotten to know them over the years. In other words, many have good qualities and are decent folk despite how they make their living. But by all accounts, Vinny Bruno held no such favor and garnered no such respect from anyone on either side of the street so to speak.

Did he have allies in the mob? I’m sure he had a few. Even the most hated individual is liked by somebody, somewhere. But by and large, he was a heartless and cruel man, who had not a shred of warmth or compassion for anybody….and as far as can be ascertained, no one mourned his death or shed a tear in his memory…

This is just one more mob story of the New York underworld.

Until next time “The Other Guy”

Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro – A Vicious Mob Enforcer

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Vincent (Vinny Bruno) Mauro – A Vicious Mob Enforcer

Unlock This Door to the Underworld

Take the Journey!

You May Also Enjoy

Racketeer Snapshot: Connecticut’s Frank (The Cigar) Piccolo

The Anthony Strollo Regime of NY/NJ

The Day Charlie (the Bug) Workman Saved a Horse

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