Underboss: Sammy the Bull Gravano's Story of Life in the Mafia

355 Pages·1997·1.35 MB·English

by  Peter Maas

Peter Maas
Peter Maas is the author ofthe internationalbestseller The
ValachiPapers, whichRudolphGiuliani, thena federalprosecutor
and now the mayor ofNew York City, hailed as“the most important
book ever writtenabout the Mafia inAmerica.”Untilnow. In
Underboss, based ondozens ofhours ofinterviews withGravano,
muchofit writteninSammythe Bull’s ownvoice, we are ushered as
never before into the uppermost secret inner sanctums ofCosa
Nostra—anunderworld ofpower, lust, greed, betrayal, deception,
sometimes evenhonor, withthe specter ofviolent deathalways
poised inthe wings. It is a realworld we have oftenread and
heard about fromthe outside;now we are able to experience it in
rich, no-holds-barred detailas ifwe were there ourselves.
Unlike his glamorous boss JohnGotti, Sammythe Bullhonored Cosa
Nostra’s ancient traditions, jigging the shadows, avoiding the
limelight, staying far fromflashbulbs and reporters. But he was
present at suchkeyevents ofthe modernCosa Nostra as the
sensationalslaying ofmobboss PaulCastellano, Gotti’s
predecessor, infront ofa mid- townManhattansteakhouse.
Compulsivelyreadable, Gravano’s revelations are ofenormous
historicalsignificance.“There has never beena defendant ofhis
stature inorganized crime,”the federaljudge inthe Gottitrial
declared, “who has made the leap he hasmade fromone socialplanet
to another.”
Gravano’s is a storyabout starting out onthe street, about
killing and being killed, revealing the truthbehind a
quarter-centuryofshocking headlines. It is also a tragic storyof
a wasted life, ofunalterable choices and the weboflies,
weakness, and treacherythat underlie the so-called Honored
Society.
Harper Collins Publishers
New York
Copyright © 1997 byPeter Maas
Allrights reserved.
No part ofthis book maybe used or reproduced inanymanner whatsoever
without writtenpermissionexcept inthe case ofbriefquotations embodied
incriticalarticles and reviews. For informationaddress: HarperCollins
Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rdStreet, New York, NY 10022.
HarperCollins books maybe purchased for educational, business, or sales
promotionaluse. For informationplease write: SpecialMarkets Department,
HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 0-060-18256-3
Printed inthe United States ofAmerica.
For myloved ones—mywife, Suzanne, and mysons, John-Michaeland
Terrence. And inloving memoryofAudrey
OTHER BOOKS BY
PETER MAAS
NONFICTION
Killer Spy
Ina Child’s Name:The Legacyofa Mother’s Murder
Manhunter
Marie: ATrue Story
King ofthe Gypsies
Serpico
The ValachiPapers
The Rescuer
FICTION
China White
Father and Son
Made inAmerica
Preface
Inwhat law enforcement officials described as the AmericanMafia’s
highest-ranking desertion, JohnGotti’s right-hand maninthe Gambino
organized-crime familyhas defected and is expected to be a Government
witness against Mr. Gottioncharges that he is the nation’s top Mafia
leader, law enforcement officials said yesterday.
The Gotticonfidante, Salvatore Gravano, who was indicted last year as
a co-defendant withMr. Gottionmurder and racketeering charges, has
entered the FederalWitness ProtectionProgramand was secretlytransferred
last week froma FederaljailinManhattanwhere he had beenheld without
bailwithMr. Gotti, officials said.
The authorities asserted that because ofthe two men’s close ties, Mr.
Gravano’s testimonycould provide a crushing blow to Mr. Gotti, who has
beenacquitted onlesser charges at three trials inthe last five years and
has become the No. 1 target ofFederalinvestigators.
The New York Times, November 12, 1991
1
They’re people, but they’re bad people.
“Yeah, you could sayI came froma prettytoughneighborhood,”
Salvatore (Sammythe Bull) Gravano said.
The neighborhood was Bensonhurst, roughlytwo miles square, in
southwesternBrooklynbordering Gravesend Bayand the Atlantic Ocean.
Unlike the first Italiancommunities inNew York, suchas Manhattan’s
Little Italy, whichwas being swallowed up byanaggressivelyexpanding
Chinatown, or East Harlem, clinging to a narrow strip along the East River
against the inroads ofa booming Hispanic population, Bensonhurst remained
vibrantlyand definitivelyItalian-American. Eventodayit is where recent
arrivals fromsouthernItalyand Sicilysettle. InRomanCatholic
churches, some masses are sung inItalian.
As withother ethnic migrations inthe city, the subwaypaved the way
wheninthe early1900s the first rapid transit lines linking Brooklynto
Manhattanwent into service, one ofthemgoing directlyfromthe dark and
crowded tenements ofLittle Italyto the openspaces ofBensonhurst.
It has a small-townfeel. Manyofthe cross streets lack traffic
lights. Cruising taxis, commoninmost ofthe city, are rare. Houses are
mostlytwo-familydwellings ofaluminumsiding, stucco or brick with
wrought-irongates painted white and porches withtheir ubiquitous steel
awnings. Tinyfront lawns feature potted flowers and statues ofthe Virgin
Maryand inbackyards, more oftenthannot, are vegetable gardens.
Bensonhurst’s mainstreet, 18thAvenue, also officiallydesignated
Cristoforo Colombo Boulevard, is lined withItaliandelicatessens,
bakeries, freshmozzarella shops, food markets overflowing withpackaged
products imported fromItaly, pizza parlors boasting traditional
wood-burning ovens and espresso bars.
InBensonhurst, everyone knows everyone else oneveryblock. Its
mainlyblue-collar residents are insular, close-mouthed and suspicious of
outsiders. Strangers are remarked onat once. As a result, the rate of
commonstreet crimes—rapes, robberies, felonyassaults—is low compared to
other parts ofthe city, according to police statistics. Murder is a third
less thanthe city-wide average.
But Bensonhurst was toughina veryspecialsense. Agreat number of
these murders were mobrelated. It was a prime spawning ground for Cosa
Nostra—“Our Thing”—whichfilled its ranks fromlocalyouthstreet gangs
that hung out at candystores and luncheonettes throughout the area. One
ofthe originalmembers ofCosa Nostra’s nationalcommission, Joseph
Profaci, the so-called Olive OilKing because ofhis monopolyonthe
importationofolive oilfromItaly, lived inBensonhurst. So did his
successor as a familyboss, JosephColombo. One ofthe grandest underworld
funerals ever seeninNew York, complete withthirty-eight carloads of
flowers, took place inBensonhurst following the Prohibition-era slaying of
a celebrated mobster named Frankie Yale, who had a falling out withAl
Capone.
As ina Sicilianvillage, Cosa Nostra’s shadow loomed large over
Bensonhurst and was spokenofonlyinwhispers. “Theyjust shoot
themselves,” a resident confided after two corpses were found ina car,
gazing vacantlyinto space, eachwitha bullet hole behind the ear. “The
thing is, you mind your ownbusiness. You don’t hear nothing. You don’t
see nothing.” Another said, “You got to admit the Mafia, whatever, keeps
the neighborhood safe. You don’t see allthemother people coming into
mug and burglarize here. So their presence is kind ofgood is myopinion.”
Salvatore Gravano was borninBensonhurst onMarch12, 1945. He had
two older sisters. Another sister and a brother had died before his
arrival. His mother, Caterina, was borninSicilyand brought to America
as a baby. His father, Giorlando, also fromSicily, was onthe crew ofa
freighter whenhe jumped ship inCanada and slipped into the United States
as anillegalalien.
For Sammyand for friends and neighbors, his parents were always Kay
and Gerry. Englishwas the language ofthe house, except during visits
fromhis grandmothers, who spoke a Siciliandialect. Sammywas especially
close to his maternalgrandmother and picked up enoughto be able to
converse withher, but forgot it allafter she died.
He was called Sammyinstead ofSalvatore or Salfor as long as he can
remember. Someone had said that he looked just like Uncle Sammy, a brother
ofhis mother’s, and the name stuck. The uncle was Big Sammyand he was
Little Sammy. He grew up on78thStreet inthe heart ofBensonhurst near
18thAvenue. His father owned the house, the middle one ofthree identical
brick row houses, eachwitha garage. Steps led up to the front porch.
The basement apartment was rented out, as wellas anapartment onthe
second floor. The Gravanos lived inthe middle apartment. Ina smallplot
behind the house, Sammy’s father cultivated tomatoes and beans and tended
to his prized fig tree.
Kaywas anexceptionallyskilled seamstress who worked for a Jewish
dress manufacturer inManhattan’s garment center. Gerrywas a house
painter untilhe was felled bylead poisoning and could no longer continue
his trade. The dress manufacturer thenfinanced the Gravanos ina
satellite factoryoftheir owninBensonhurst. Kaysupervised the filling
ofthe orders he sent her and rode the subwayto the garment center to sew
the sample dress for a forthcoming line, while Sammy’s father took care of
the business end. Things went so wellthat Gerrywas able to afford the
purchase ofa summer cottage for $8,000 near Lake Ronkonkoma inthe middle
ofLong Island.
OnSundaymornings, Sammyusuallyaccompanied his father to mass at
the ChurchofOur LadyofGuadalupe. Downthe block, theywould pass a
corner saloon. There would always be a cluster ofmeninfront ofit,
stillothers at the bar inside. Theywere allsmartlydressed insuits, or
insharplycreased slacks and Italianknit shirts. Sammycould see the
glitter fromthe diamond rings manyofthemwore. There oftenwas a crap
game inprogress right onthe sidewalk withwads ofbills being passed back
and forth. Sometimes a police car parked there, and two or three ofthe
menwould saunter over and banter withthe cops. Sammycould hear the
laughter. He noticed that while his father always stayed onthe opposite
side ofthe street, some ofthe menwould wave to himand callout, “How
you doin’, Gerry?”and his father would nod back inacknowledgment.
Finally, whenSammywas about eight, he asked, “Who are those men, Dad?
You know them?”
“Yes, I know some ofthem. Theyare not hardworking, nice people.
They’re bad people, but they’re our bad people.”
This onlyexcited Sammy’s curiosityand he kept pressing his father
for more details. “What I got fromhimlittle bylittle,” Sammysays,“was
that these menwere people I should stayawayfromand not ever talk about.
But theyhad ties to the community. He told me that there was a lot of
prejudice against the Italianpeople whentheyfirst came over here,
especiallyfromthe Irishcops and politicians, and Italians went to these
mento resolve their problems whenthe police, whatever, wouldn’t do
nothing. So the communitywould back themup ifthere was a beating or a
shooting that the cops were trying to find out about. I guess myfather
was trying to schoolme that theywere bad guys, but we should never go
against them, never callthe police about anything we saw themdoing. We
don’t know anything. We don’t ask questions. We don’t get involved. We
walk onthe other side ofthe street.”
At age nine, Sammyhad a traumatic experience that changed the whole
course ofhis life. He was held back inthe fourthgrade. Whenhis
parents went to P. S. 186 to find out what was wrong, theywere told that
Sammy, unfortunately, was“a slow learner.” As theypersisted intheir
inquiry, the analysis grew harsher. Sammywas exhibiting allthe signs of
being mentallyretarded.
Sammy, infact, was the victimofa severe case ofdyslexia. For
Sammy, a d became a b. Aletter like r reversed itself. Words got
jumbled—god transposed into dog. The number 3 became 8. But inthe
elementaryschools ofBensonhurst inthe 1950s, nobodyseemed to know about
dyslexia. There were no remedialoptions available.
Inrepeating the fourthgrade, humiliationpiled onhumiliation. He
was relegated to the back ofthe class. Astudent seated up front would be
asked to spellinvitation. Another would be asked to spellindependence.
Thenthe teacher would callout to Sammyand ask himto spellcat. Knowing
titters would ripple throughthe class. “You just felt like you were a
moron,”he says. “WhenI felt like that, I started to reject schoolas
something that wasn’t for me. And authority, too. Being rejected by
teachers like you were a retard. The hellwiththat. So I fought back. I
rejected them.”
At first, to cope, he tried being the class clown. Whenthat didn’t
work, he took another tack. Althoughas anadult he is onlyfive feet
five, he didn’t stop growing untilhis teens. At nine years old, he was
about the same size as the other boys and physicallystrong. Ifsomeone
ridiculed him, he beat himup after school. That instantlyended the
slights. “That’s whenI found out that violence paid,”he says. “They
stopped laughing.”
The onlypeople who didn’t care about his reading and spelling
abilities were the menat the corner saloon. Theywere the ones who named
himSammythe Bull. “It was mytenthbirthday, I think,”said Sammy,“and
myfather and mother gave me a brand-new bike. We didn’t have a lot of
moneyto throw around, so whentheygave you something, you had to take
care ofit. I was realhappy, but thenthe bike was robbed. It was my
fault. I left it unwatched, unprotected. Maybe a week later a couple of
myfriends, little kids like me, told me that theysaw the bike near a
fruit stand onthe corner across fromthe bar where those wiseguys hung
out. I randownthere and sure enoughtwo kids bigger and older thanme
from79thStreet had it.
“I went and grabbed the handlebars and I said, ‘Hey, this is mybike.’
But theywouldn’t give it back. So I started fighting bothofthem. It
was hard going. I mean, I was getting a little beat up, but I was fighting
myass off. I wasn’t giving up that bike. I was doing prettygood, but I
wasn’t winning, either. It was like whensomebodywould look at you and
say, ‘Wow, you must have beeninsome fight,’ and you’d say, ‘Yeah, well,
you ought to see the other guy.’