Imagine that you grew up as the son of the notorious underboss of New York s Colombo crime family, and became extremely successful himself. He s been called one of the biggest mob earners since Al Capone. But he has since left his life of crime behind and is now a best-selling author, speaker, and host of Sit Down With Michael Franzese on YouTube.
00:03:38.320Well, you know, my very earliest memory, and it's amazing how you can remember some things that just really impact you.
00:03:46.260I was probably four years old, and we were in Brooklyn at the time, but my dad had moved us out to my grandmother's house who lived in Long Island.
00:03:56.180And I hadn't seen him for a couple of days, I assume.
00:04:06.300So his right hand guy, a guy by the name of Joey, who is again, my dad's right hand guy, was out on the porch and I can see through the window and he was kind of like standing guard.
00:04:16.340My dad comes in, hugs my mom and, you know, they talk for a few minutes.
00:04:22.060Then he comes over to me. I was sitting on the steps and he gives me a big hug.
00:04:26.140And, you know, I love your son and all of that. And I didn't know what was going on.
00:04:29.840And then he left. Well, what I realized later on, it was that was during the Profaci Gallo war and they had taken to the mattresses, as the saying goes.
00:04:40.280And my dad wasn't around for a while. That's the earliest memory that I have.
00:04:44.400And it just continued there because my dad was so high profile.
00:04:48.800He was always under investigation, always a major target of law enforcement.
00:04:52.600I always say he was kind of like the John Gotti of his day.
00:04:55.480So, you know, it's it's my memory, you know, going way back and he was always in the media.
00:05:01.880So, you know, I had issues at school because my dad, you know, guys was, hey, you got a mafia dad.
00:05:06.800You know, I would fight because I love my dad. I didn't care what anybody said.
00:05:10.280And so it was, you know, from my earliest days that I remember that.
00:05:14.780And did you did he ever like tell you, you know, I'm in this thing called the mafia.
00:05:20.020This is what I do. You can't talk about it. How did you come to realize he was part of this organization?
00:05:25.020you know one of the many things i respect about my dad at that time he never brought what was going
00:05:31.740on outside into the house he would never talk about it he would never mention it obviously
00:05:37.900you know every once in a while i'd hear a crack because law enforcement was outside surveilling
00:05:42.860him but he would never bring it up he would never admit to anything never talk about anything
00:05:47.360obviously a lot of his guys were coming to the house all the time but to me they were like uncle
00:05:52.280you know, Uncle Sam, Uncle this guy. So it was normal, you know, but I saw the way my dad was
00:05:58.360treated. We would go to the Copacabana and go out places. And, you know, he always had a lot
00:06:02.960of respect. People, he had a lot of charisma and he commanded a lot of respect in that regard.
00:06:08.060But never, never, never did he mention anything when I was younger. Never.
00:09:30.160You become, I mean, I'm picturing something, of course, like Goodfellas, where you're a young kid and you're entranced by the lifestyle and you feel like a big man.
00:09:38.120But you tell me, how did you get attracted to the business yourself and make the decision to join?
00:09:44.020You know, it was just the opposite with me.
00:09:45.660My dad, you know, preached against me doing anything but getting an education.
00:09:50.380He wanted me to go to school, wanted me to be a doctor.
00:09:53.780He was, you know, hell bent on education.
00:09:56.820Mike, you're going to be the first professional in the family.
00:10:01.660It wasn't until, you know, he was indicted in a federal case for masterminding a nationwide string of bank robberies.
00:10:08.340He gets convicted. He gets a 50 year prison sentence in 1967.
00:10:13.140And in 1970, when I was 19, he went off to do his time.
00:10:18.140Joe Colombo, who was the boss of our family, and I was very close with their family, he kind of takes me under his wing.
00:10:23.840We start to march with the Italian American Civil Rights League.
00:10:27.240We were marching against the FBI for, you know, defaming Italian Americans.
00:10:31.140So I got very involved in the league as a way to help my dad, because, Megan, I'll tell you this, you know, when we get later on in this, I went to jail for a crime that I was guilty of.
00:10:40.840I pled guilty, did my time. My dad obviously did a lot of bad things in his life.
00:10:45.060But that particular crime that he did 40 years in prison on, my dad was innocent of.
00:10:50.800I'll take that to my grave. We investigated every one of those witnesses.
00:10:55.460They recanted their testimony. We gave them lie detective tests, proved they lied at the trial.
00:11:00.180we can never get the conviction overturned. So I was hellbent on trying to help my dad prove his
00:11:05.780innocence because he had essentially a death sentence. He went in when he was 50 years old,
00:11:10.34050 on top of that, you know, that's a long time. So I got into that life because I lost interest
00:11:16.660in school. I was a sophomore in college and I was a pre-med student. I was highly influenced
00:11:22.840by Joe Colombo and the guys that, you know, that I met during that time. And they would say, Mike,
00:11:28.140if you don't help your father out, he's going to die in prison. So I went to see him in Leavenworth
00:11:32.520in the penitentiary. And we sat in the visiting room. I said, Dad, you tell me you're innocent.
00:11:36.460I believe you. I'm not going to school anymore. If I don't help you out, you're going to die in
00:11:40.600here. And we had a pretty intense discussion because he was against it. But he knew my mind
00:11:46.260was made up and I was a pretty headstrong kid. So he said to me, son, if you're going to be on the
00:11:50.200street, you know, I want you on the street the right way. And then, you know, Megan, I don't0.78
00:11:56.300like to, you know, say this, I don't like to be offensive to people, but he asked me one question0.95
00:12:01.560and he said, son, if you had to kill anybody, could you do it? And I thought about it for a
00:12:06.940minute, you know, kind of a little bit surprised by the question, but I said, dad, the circumstances
00:12:11.720were right. I can do it. And he said, that's the right answer. Go home. Somebody's going to be in
00:12:16.500touch with you. Do whatever you're told. And that's when he proposed me for membership in the
00:12:20.580life. Wow. It's almost like you were on the same path as Michael Corleone in The Godfather, right?
00:12:28.600He was supposed to be the son who didn't get drawn into the business. He was going to be a senator
00:12:32.580in a position of power. You were supposed to become a doctor and pursue a legit life.
00:12:38.000And yet you did get pulled. You did get pulled in. Yes. And, you know, it's like I said, it wasn't
00:12:44.860even though I was around my dad. And listen, we always got first class treatment. I can't tell
00:12:49.880how many times, Megan, I went to the Copacabana. We met everybody from Sinatra on down. And they
00:12:55.380all had respect for my dad. And the owner, Julie Padel, loved my father. And we got that kind of
00:13:00.380treatment. My dad was also in the music business. I met a lot of artists when I was younger.
00:13:05.360So he carried himself in that way where people were attracted to him. And he was a tremendous
00:13:11.040influence on me in that regard. I watched him. I observed him. But I didn't want to be a gangster.
00:13:16.880it. That's not what my life was all about. You know, I, I was heading the legitimate way. And
00:13:22.980then I got drawn in because I just felt, you know, it was incumbent upon me to help my dad. I was
00:13:28.520also the oldest of the kids, you know, and there's a myth in that life that, you know, once you're
00:13:33.460part of that life, you go to prison, they take care of you forever. That's not true. Whatever
00:13:38.080my dad had on the street at the time, you know, it ran out after about two years, and then we were
00:13:44.100on our own. So I had to help support the family and do all the things that, you know, an oldest
00:13:48.580son would do. Wow. I didn't realize that. I thought I thought I believe the myth, too.
00:13:54.860So now you're what, like in your young 20s. And what how did you start to become a part of it?
00:14:01.920You know, do they do they give you a gun and say you've got to shoot somebody? This is one of the
00:14:05.800rumors that you've got to shoot somebody. You've got to kill somebody in order to officially1.00
00:14:08.760be accepted as part of the mafia. Is that true? How did you realize you were in and what was0.98
00:14:15.840expected of you? Well, my dad sent word, you know, downtown to the officials. About two weeks later,
00:14:23.200a cop regime or captain in a family picked me up and he took me to see the boss. Now,
00:14:28.060Joe Colombo had been shot seriously wounded at a big rally we had for the Italian American Civil
00:14:33.660Rights League at Columbus Circle. And I was like 12 steps away from him when that happened.
00:14:38.760So a new boss had taken over. He's passed on now, Tom DiBella. And I sat with Tom. He says, Mike, I got a message from your father. He said, you want to become a member of our life. Is that true? And I said, yes. He said, well, here's the deal. From now on, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you're on call to serve this family, the Colombo family.
00:14:57.200And that means if your mother is sick and she's dying and we call you to service and you're at her bedside, you leave your mother's side.
00:15:04.360You come and serve us from now on. We're number one in your life before anything and everything.
00:15:09.160When and if we feel you deserve this privilege, this honor to become a member, we'll let you know.
00:15:14.600And that's how it started. I was 21 years old. I was in kind of like a pledge period.
00:15:20.200I was a recruit. That's the official title of that, where I had to do anything and everything I was told to do to prove myself worthy.
00:15:26.560And, you know, it could have been something very menial, a lot of discipline in that life, a lot of alleged respect, a lot of, you know, authority.
00:15:34.100You had a meeting at eight o'clock. You weren't there at 730. You were late. Can never be late in that life.
00:15:39.460Drive the boss to a meeting, sit in the car two, three, four hours. God forbid you leave, go to the restroom, get a newspaper.
00:15:45.400He comes out. You're not there. You're in trouble. You know, I know I did that once. I paid the price.
00:15:49.660a lot of stuff like that. And, you know, Megan, I got to be honest. You know, the life is very
00:15:56.240violent at times. And if you're part of that life, you're part of the violence and there's no escape.
00:16:01.060And if anybody tells you differently, they're either not being honest with you or they weren't
00:16:04.960a made man in that life. And, you know, I think you know what I mean. It's but, you know, here's
00:16:10.020the other myth. You know, a lot of guys talk about, you know, all these killings like we ran
00:16:15.300around all day long and all we did was baseball bat people and murder people. Absolutely not true.
00:16:22.380You know, in our life and at least in our family, I can tell you this, you know, murder was taken
00:16:30.280very seriously. It was a last course of action. It had to be approved by the boss. There was
00:16:35.360discussion over it most of the time, at least that my experience in the 20 plus years are put
00:16:41.020to that life. It wasn't that guys were around running around every day just targeting people
00:16:45.940to hurt. And I know, you know, there's a lot of guys on YouTube that talk that way now. That
00:16:51.040wasn't my experience. But it is part of the life. And if you're called upon to do it, you got to do
00:16:57.900it. Was it petty crime? Was it like you didn't pay back the loan, so I got to break your legs?
00:17:04.660That's not petty. But I'm just saying it wasn't it was violent, but it wasn't murder. So did you
00:17:08.880have to hurt people? Because I feel like that would be a before and after moment.
00:17:13.280Well, let's put it this way. You know, a lot of I had a lot of bookmakers around me that were
00:17:17.580taking, you know, obviously taking bets illegally at the time. And, you know, the last course of
00:17:24.120action is to hurt somebody, because if somebody is in debt to you, you want to you want them to
00:17:28.100pay you. It's only if they're, you know, doing something like so obnoxious to you that, hey,
00:17:33.480you've got to teach this guy a lesson. But it's not the first course of action, at least with me,
00:17:38.060it wasn't. And with most of the people that I knew at that time, certainly not with my dad,
00:17:41.980that wasn't a first course of action. But did it happen at times? Yeah, I'm not going to say it
00:17:46.880didn't. And you know, there was kind of a, it was kind of two different categories, I would say in
00:17:51.820that life. You're either a racketeer, or you're a gangster. Give you an example. In our family,
00:17:57.600we had 115 made guys at that time. This was after I took the oath. 115 made guys out of that 115,
00:18:04.700maybe 20 of us were real earners we were bringing money into the life 20 the other 95 you know who's
00:18:12.060got a no-show job who's got a gambling who's trying to do something just to to make a few bucks
00:18:17.220and they're the guys that you know were leaned upon most of the time to do the work because
00:18:22.320you got to earn your way in that life guys that are bringing in money they want to protect those
00:18:27.540guys however a gangster never really had the ability to become a racketeer because if he did
00:18:33.520he would be and he'd be earning. But a racketeer has to be both because you're going to be called
00:18:37.980upon in that life to do what you have to do and you can't refuse and you got to be capable in
00:18:42.260that regard. So, you know, but again, the smarter guys, you don't want to hurt people every day.
00:18:48.280That's not what we would have to do. It must have been a jarring flip, right? To go from
00:18:55.060this world in which you thought you were going to be a doctor healing people to this world in which
00:18:59.940you became part of the mafia, sometimes having to hurt people, right? Like, do you ever think
00:19:05.660about it like that? You know, I did, Megan, but quite honestly, maybe it was because being around
00:19:13.080my dad my whole life, or maybe I did have something in me. Maybe I wasn't destined to be a
00:19:18.580doctor. I don't know. I mean, I often reflected on that myself and said, you know, how do I,
00:19:24.320how did I adapt to this so well? Um, because, you know, I had some success in life and look,
00:19:30.660I'll be honest with you. You know, I had a very idealistic view of the life when I got into the
00:19:35.140life, you know, they told me, Hey, you know, you don't ever have to worry wherever you go in the
00:19:39.700world. Somebody's going to have your back. Don't ever worry about your mother, your sister, your
00:19:43.400wife, your daughter, nobody's ever going to hurt them. We'll protect them. You have a brotherhood
00:19:47.520around you. You know, I was going to be, you know, bonded in blood in a different way. Um, you know,
00:19:53.120with my father than I already was. So I had a very idealistic view of the life coming in. I
00:19:58.920was excited about it, you know, and I wanted to be the best possible mob guy could be at that time.
00:20:03.480So, you know, maybe, maybe I did have it in me all the time. I just didn't know it.
00:20:15.420This is mobs for dummies. So to become a made guy, what does it mean? And I know you took like
00:20:21.920the oath of omerta which i really i think i also took that same oath at fox news um but is that
00:20:28.160only when you become a made guy or is that just like when you first sort of joined the mob
00:20:32.600yeah well i was in kind of like i said a recruit period and it was an interesting period because
00:20:39.260from 19 from the early 1950s right through 1974 75 they had an expression in the life that covered
00:20:47.680all five families and that the books were closed. They weren't making or recruiting any new guys.
00:20:54.580The only way they were able to do that in one of the families, if somebody died, they were able to
00:20:59.180bring another guy in to replace that person. So when I was a recruit, I was around guys that
00:21:04.920were waiting 20 years to become a made guy. Meaning what, though? Because you're in the
00:21:10.220mafia, but you're not made. I mean, I only know the Goodfellas reference. When Joe Pesci's
00:21:14.940character became made. He became more important somehow, but he was in the mob prior to that
00:21:18.820moment. Right. Well, prior to that, you become an associate, meaning that somebody that's an
00:21:25.340official in that life puts you on record with them and you're officially with that person.
00:21:30.340That makes you an official associate. Nobody else can do business with you unless the maid guy says
00:21:36.040it's okay. And he has complete authority over you. He's responsible for you and you're responsible
00:21:41.040to answer to him. That's an associate. So when you're a recruit like I was, I was an associate.
00:21:47.260But it's not an official position in that life. Once you get, you know, you prove yourself and
00:21:54.020you're approved to become a maid member, which is the term that they use, well, then you take an
00:21:59.980oath and you become a soldier. And a soldier is the first official position in that life.
00:22:05.780The next ranking up is a cop regime or a captain.
00:22:09.040And then you have the hierarchy, which is the boss, the underboss, and the consigliere.
00:29:21.200I had a couple of restaurants that I was involved in.
00:29:24.300I had a film production company at one point in time that actually we made about 30 films at the time and distributed them throughout the world.
00:29:33.000So I had a lot of legitimate things going on.
00:29:35.820But the the biggest enterprise or scam, whatever you want to call it, that I got involved in was the wholesale gasoline business.
00:29:44.000And in a nutshell, I devised a scheme along with a partner to defraud the government out of taxing every gallon of gasoline.
00:29:51.460And it was an operation we ran for about eight years.0.91
00:29:54.040I had the Russian mob guys from Brighton Beach involved with me.0.57
00:29:57.540I had about 350 gas stations I either owned or operated at that time.0.72
00:30:01.760And I had 18 companies that were licensed to collect the tax on every gallon of gasoline.
00:30:08.220At the height of our operation, we're selling a half a billion gallons of gas a month.
00:30:11.960And we're taking down 20, 30, 40 cents a gallon, whatever the mark would bear at that time.
00:30:16.440So we're bringing in several million dollars a week.
00:30:19.440And that was, there were other guys doing it.
00:30:22.860You know, some of the Russians were doing it. But I think we perfected the system and lasted quite long.
00:30:30.360And we had a lot of other people that were trying to do it that were involved with us.
00:30:33.840So we we created that scam. And it was, you know, people said it was the biggest scam since prohibition.
00:30:40.060And I believe that. I don't think there was anything else because we weren't big drug dealers.
00:30:45.040And obviously, when you talk drugs, you know, enormous money.
00:30:48.140But we weren't big drug dealers, despite what everybody says. Not true.
00:30:51.780when I took an oath, they told me straight out, you deal with drugs, you die.
00:30:56.420And we weren't allowed to touch it. And it was some guys doing it on the sly. Yeah. But we
00:31:00.460weren't major drug dealers, at least back during my era. So, you know, I was doing a lot of things
00:31:06.840and I had a head for business and I just kept plugging away. What do you do with the money?
00:31:11.460Do you turn it over to the family? Do you put it in a checking account?
00:31:15.020Well, you know, we do both. I mean, I had to give up 25% of my whatever I earned,
00:31:23.040how to go up the ladder to the family. And that's the deal that I made with the boss at the time.
00:31:28.140And then, you know, I had several bank accounts. I had bank accounts overseas that we wired money
00:31:33.700out to. I had a lot of cash at that time. I had a safe in my house. So, you know, different ways.
00:31:39.380And you wash money. And when I was in the film business, I produced a couple of movies with,
00:31:44.600you know, gas tax money that I had cleaned up. So, you know, it became a chore, quite honestly,
00:31:51.200because we had so much money coming in and we had to devise a system to get rid of it,
00:31:57.020basically, or to put it in places that was secure. Do you, is it like the movies where you
00:32:01.900get in trouble if you're too flashy, if your wife buys a fur coat, you know, you're supposed to look
00:32:06.700like you're not making that kind of dough? Well, you know, some guys like my dad, I mean,
00:32:14.740he would drive around in a 1964 Red Plymouth Valiant that my mother wouldn't even get into.
00:32:20.560I mean, he didn't want anybody to know what he was doing in a way. I wasn't that way. I mean,
00:32:25.820look, I was earning money. So, I mean, I had a jet plane. I had a helicopter. I had houses in
00:32:30.940three parts of the country. You know, one house I built on two acres of land with a racquetball
00:32:36.020court and all of that. So but I was making legitimate money. I was paying taxes at that
00:32:40.120time, too. So I was able to show that. But no, we didn't get in trouble for that. I mean,
00:32:46.700nobody told us how to live. You know, if I mean, if there was something like in the movie Goodfellas
00:32:52.980and you had to lay low for a while, I mean, that was certainly a possibility. But I wasn't in that
00:32:58.580category. You mentioned that you made some movies and it just so happens that the producer of this
00:33:04.820segment, Natasha is a huge fan of one of your movies called Mausoleum. So she has queued up
00:33:12.020this, this little clip, uh, in part of the trailer for the audience and sought to.
00:33:17.480She gave her soul to the evil force in the mausoleum. What's the matter, Susan?
00:35:30.940It was crazy. This business is so crazy. You never know what's going to happen.
00:35:36.160It's so rare to make money off of the movies. It happens once in a million.
00:35:42.900So, OK, Mausoleum comes out. Now you're in the movie business. That's kind of exciting.
00:35:47.540And was there ever like you said you met Frank Sinatra at the Copacabana?
00:35:52.380You know, how incestuous do you feel like Hollywood, the entertainment industry is with the mafia?
00:35:59.540Because, you know, there's all sorts of speculation.
00:36:03.220Well, look, we had relationships there for sure.
00:36:06.360I mean, there was, you know, agents that I was very close with, one in particular that's passed away now.
00:36:11.620But so, you know, Megan, I have to tell you this.
00:36:15.740A lot of people in the industry liked being around us.
00:36:19.120We didn't have to chase them and threaten them and do all of that.
00:36:21.780They enjoyed our company, some of the guys.
00:36:24.120Like, they loved being around my father.
00:36:25.460I think people enjoyed being around to me because, you know, we carried ourselves a certain way.
00:36:30.380We weren't looking to put the arm on somebody all the time.
00:36:34.060And so they enjoyed being in business with us.
00:36:36.580And I don't I don't have to tell you, you know, in this business, if you can bring money to the table, people like you.
00:36:41.240I don't think they really care who you are, you know, in many cases.
00:36:44.840But, you know, so look, we did have involvement.
00:36:47.760We didn't control the industry in any way.
00:36:50.080I wouldn't say that. But did we have, you know, presence there?
00:36:53.640Yes. Listen, did Joe Colombo absolutely have an impact on the movie The Godfather?
00:36:59.700A hundred percent. I mean, I don't know if you saw that series, The Offer.
00:37:03.840Yeah, but I actually am watching that right now.
00:37:06.580Well, I thought it was brilliantly done. I mean, I really did. And a lot of it was true.
00:37:11.460You know, that was my era. I was there during all of that. And I was very close to Joey at that time.
00:37:15.960So a lot of it was very accurate. And, you know, he did have that control and he did have an impact.
00:37:22.520the word mafia was taken out of the script. That's for sure. Joey did that. He did shut it
00:37:27.000down at some point, you know, with the union and they did have to come back to him in order to
00:37:31.000continue production. So, you know, we did have influence. What about, you know, I realize the
00:37:37.260mafia is not what it used to be, but when you're out there walking around as a civilian, what are
00:37:43.580the businesses you, you go by or you go into where you're like, probably connected? Oh gosh.
00:37:51.320Well, unions, you know, for sure. And, you know, another myth. Another myth is that my guys, we sit in our social clubs and we target the next business that we're going to take over, defraud, influence or whatever. Not always so. So often people from inside their company would come to us. Hey, we have a way to defraud our company. We have a way to make some money. You know, you're going to protect us. You're going to give us money. You're never going to tell on us.
00:38:19.280So a lot of people from inside the company would come to us. Happened to me with General Motors, happened to me with Mazda, happened to me with GE Credit quite often. And that's how I got involved in some legitimate businesses. But, you know, look, unions, of course, you know, I'll tell you this, too. You know, people come to me about Donald Trump. Did Donald Trump deal with the mob? And yeah, he did. And so did Helmsley. And so did Gutterman. And so did anybody in New York that wanted to get that building made and had to deal with the unions. You just had to.
00:38:49.020And, you know, so does that make somebody in bed with the mob?
00:41:16.920I knew Jimmy Burke and Paulie Barrio, you know, was a dear friend of mine and the family's.
00:41:22.240But I was surprised because that was a different family.
00:41:25.760And Nick Pelleggi, who was the writer, after I saw that, I called Nick up and I said, Nick, why'd you throw me in there?
00:41:32.320He said, oh, Michael, you had name value and all that.
00:41:34.360And, you know, you knew all those guys and said, yeah, but you could have at least got them to say my name correctly, you know, so he left it.
00:41:46.060OK, so eventually Rudy Giuliani does come into your life.
00:41:50.440And, you know, Rudy Giuliani, we kind of know him much differently today, but he was, I mean, an absolute hero in many ways back in the day and cleaning up New York.
00:42:00.700He was he was the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, which is considered the most prestigious U.S. attorney post in the in the country.
00:42:07.900And when he was young, he wasn't kidding around.
00:42:10.200He was, I mean, a true crime fighter and very focused on the mob.
00:56:12.340I knew Lefty fairly well, and he just nailed, he nailed that character so well. He was just great. Really great.
00:56:21.060What did you make of, you said you knew Henry Hill, that was the Ray Liotta character in Godfather, Godfather, Goodfellas.
00:56:27.360What did you think of that portrayal? Because that was, I mean, I don't know, you know, everybody loves Godfather, including me, but Goodfellas was just such a riveting film where you couldn't, you were so pulled in by that character, Henry Hill.
00:56:39.720I told you I got to get out of here and straighten out everything with Paulie or else I'm dead, Karen.
00:56:44.560Then you're better off staying in here.
00:56:46.480Karen, they could whack me in here just as easy as they can outside.0.60
01:02:45.320And I can tell you this, Megan, I didn't meet my wife until two years later.
01:02:49.820But I really believed I was stunned when I found that out.
01:02:52.880And it was true because I said, man, if this life can separate me and my dad, what do I really have here?
01:02:59.100And I just filed it away. I didn't say anything.
01:03:01.840You don't you don't speak out of turn in that life and you don't share your thoughts with people because you never know.
01:03:06.840But I can say this. If I didn't have that meeting, I don't think I mean, if that didn't occur.
01:03:14.620I don't think I would have ever walked away from the life because I think that bond between me
01:03:19.380and my dad had to be broken and I had to get a sense of reality. And, you know, I didn't hate
01:03:25.120him for it when it finally came that he confronted me on it because he read it in my book. I wasn't
01:03:31.300going to say anything, but then it was such an impact on my life. I said, no, I have to be
01:03:35.740honest about this. So I put it in my book. That's where he reads it and he denies it. And I said,
01:03:40.940dad, remember you taught me something in life? And he said, what? He said, no matter what,
01:03:45.060deny, deny, deny, deny, deny. I said, and I know you're denying this now, but it's okay. I love
01:03:49.800you. I'm not mad. I get it. I understand. But that had such an impact on me that I think two years
01:03:56.140later when I met my wife, that's what really kind of put the icing on the cake, as they say,
01:04:01.600for me to walk away. Did your dad, because last we left off in his story, he was going to jail
01:04:07.380until he was 100. So you say he's on parole. What happened? Did he get out? Yeah, he gets out
01:04:13.440in 2017 at the age of 100. He was the oldest inmate in the system at the time. And my dad
01:04:20.620passed away at 103 during the pandemic. He was the oldest living mob guy for sure at that time,
01:04:26.980and probably the oldest guy in the world. Guys don't live to that age in that life. It's not
01:04:32.980conducive to a long lifestyle right right yeah it was amazing uh and you know we patched it up i
01:04:39.560mean i stayed with him visited him during that during that time the relationship was never
01:04:44.180exactly the same uh but he accepted what i did um because he knew i never hurt anybody and you know
01:04:51.560there was another situation came up making where you know a guy became an informant and the feds
01:04:57.300came to me again he implicated me in some things and they wanted me to cooperate with him and i
01:05:01.800said no. And I told my father, I said, Dad, look, if I were to cooperate, a lot of guys are going to
01:05:06.720go down. I'm not going to do that. Just tell them to leave me alone because I had people upset with
01:05:11.600me. There was a contract on my life from my former boss because he took it very personal when I
01:05:16.480walked away. He was really upset with me. But that backed everybody off because I said, I'm not
01:05:22.420hurting anybody. Just leave me alone. I just want to be on my own. Yeah, because nobody leaves the
01:05:27.480mob like you you stay in it till you're dead one way or the other and and you found a way out talk
01:05:33.480about threading the needle so yeah i know you've spoken about when you were in jail there was a
01:05:39.120prison guard who walked by your cell and gave you something that i think was the beginning of your
01:05:44.360transformation what was it well yeah i mean i i had done five years i'm out on parole 13 months
01:05:51.620Worst 13 months of my life. People are trying to hurt me. Feds are all over me. I'm trying to get
01:05:57.460my life reorganized in L.A. I was like a fish out of water, quite honestly. And like a fool,
01:06:03.620I violate my parole. The government was really on me. And they locked me up again. And that first0.99
01:06:09.960night, they tell me, we're going to indict you on another racketeering case. We violated your
01:06:13.800parole. You'll never see the street again, is what they told me. And they throw me in a hole in MDC
01:06:18.720in LA and they're going to transport me back to Brooklyn in the morning. And quite honestly,
01:06:24.040Megan, it was the worst night of my life because I said, wow. I said, another case? What are they
01:06:29.400bringing up now? Number one. Number two, I'm married to this girl. She waited for me five
01:06:34.540years. We have two little babies. She's 27 years old. I'm going to lose the girl I did all of this
01:06:39.140for. I said, they can't put me out on the yard. Talk to people who want to kill me. I'm going to
01:06:44.340spend the rest of my life in a six by eight cell. Having visited my dad for 20 years and seeing what
01:06:49.920it did, I said, you know what? I wish I could just close my eyes and not wake up. And that's how I
01:06:54.320felt. And, you know, honestly, I used to demean people that were suicidal. I always called them
01:06:59.280weak, can't face up to their troubles. I don't do that anymore. Now, I wasn't suicidal that night,
01:07:04.340but I can understand how you can reach a low point in your life where is it worth even going
01:07:09.620forward? Now, of course, I dissuade anybody from suicide, but I know how that feeling was. That's
01:07:14.300how I felt that night. And yeah, a prison guard walked by my cell and he says, Francis, you okay,
01:07:19.040you don't look good. And I chased him away. I said, get away from me. Leave me alone. I don't
01:07:22.280want to see any of you guys tonight. And he came back with a Bible and pushed it through the slide
01:07:27.160on the door. And I spent the next 29 months and seven days in solitary, six by eight cell,
01:07:33.84024-7, me and God. And it was during that time, Megan, that I not only studied my Bible
01:07:40.120inside out and upside down. I had my wife send me in several books and on every faith. I was
01:07:46.360studying every faith because they said, if I'm going to spend the rest of my life in this cell,
01:07:50.880I want to know where I'm going at the end of it all. And I just came out of there strongly
01:07:55.040believing in Christianity. Wow. That guard was like an angel. I mean,
01:08:01.040truly like delivering the word of God to you. And it doesn't always happen, but it took,
01:08:06.240like you heard it and you acted. It changed you. So would you say, because you met Camille,
01:08:12.000who I know has been such a game changer in your life, between Camille, the Bible, a renewed faith
01:08:18.040or maybe a brand new faith in God, how then did you come to see this other version of yourself,
01:08:25.060this other possibility for how your life could be? Well, what I found out, there's two things
01:08:33.280in life that are so important. Number one is, I always say this, and I try to mentor a lot of
01:08:38.840young people. I go into prisons and juvenile halls and spoke at many men's ministries. And I told
01:08:44.320them, you are who you hang out with in this life. If you hang with the wrong crowd, you're going to
01:08:49.380be the wrong type of person, and they will influence you. I'm on the street. Obviously,
01:08:54.000I was influenced, and that's the person who I was. And I'm not blaming the others. I'm just saying
01:08:58.580that's we're all in the same boat in that regard. And secondly, is accountability is everything in
01:09:04.740life, who you are accountable to is going to dictate the path that you serve in your life
01:09:08.760on the street, accountable to my oath, my God, my, my boss, I was a criminal. So when I come out now,
01:09:16.220I'm accountable to God first, accountable to my wife and children, not to screw up. So I end up
01:09:21.380back in prison, because I will say this, look, you can take the boy out of Brooklyn, you can't
01:09:25.780always take Brooklyn out of the void. There's a lot of times when I could react the wrong way
01:09:30.620because I still have certain instincts inside of me, but I catch myself most of the time. And I
01:09:35.500say, no, I can't do that because I'm jeopardizing the people around me and the people that I love.
01:09:40.160And so I don't want to make a mistake. It's like, look, I'll say this and I say this in church,
01:09:44.540Megan, I have no moral issue whatsoever with taking money from the government in taxes,
01:09:50.160no moral issue whatsoever, because I can do better with the money now than they can,
01:09:53.960No doubt about it. They throw all money in the toilet half the time. But I won't do it because I'm not going to jeopardize my freedom again. I'm not going to jeopardize my wife and kids and my grandkids. So you just have a different outlook. And I believe, you know, in Christianity, we believe that we're changed from the inside out.
01:10:13.600when you develop a relationship with the Lord, he's changing you from inside out. It's not your
01:10:19.360work on the outside that's doing it. And that's why it's so important to be nourished. It's so
01:10:24.300important to, you know, to read the word as often as you possibly can. You can never get enough of
01:10:29.640it and hang out with people that have the same beliefs as you. And that's what's done it for me.
01:10:36.460I mean, I don't attribute it to my work. I think I'm probably the most fortunate, most blessed
01:10:41.440person around because I should either be dead or in prison for the rest of my life. That's what I
01:10:46.180earned. I feel like you're like your dad. You're what, 71 years old now? You look amazing. You look
01:10:52.720young. You seem vibrant. You probably have another 30 years at least, but it's probably
01:10:58.660related to your good choices in your second half. Yeah, I think I'm 72 and my wife, I have five
01:11:05.720daughters and two sons well my daughters are all fitness crazy i mean they're fitness experts and
01:11:12.160personal trainers my wife that's been her lifestyle so they don't allow me to get off
01:11:17.320track in that regard so yeah and i think we have some good dna i mean my dad was one of 19 kids
01:11:22.940and all of the kids died in their late 80s 90s my dad outlived them all but um you know so we have
01:11:30.540some good dna also so you know i think that's part of it so you just got to watch yourself
01:11:34.520all right i gotta ask you this because i know you're on the straight and narrow now and you
01:11:43.780found god but you ever have the moment you know where you have like the nasty clerk at the store
01:11:48.940or what where you're like if you if you only knew like just just you know like just watch it
01:11:57.500oh absolutely megan it happens quite a bit and let me tell you something yes it would have to
01:12:03.620keep going oh my gosh i'm on social media and some of the comments that come in you want to
01:12:08.940like jump through the computer at him you know and get it but it's crazy i do yeah i have those
01:12:14.980moments you know absolutely it's like i said you don't you know you don't get a lobotomy when you
01:12:20.580where you come to christ you just you just try to you know tell your behavior the right way and and
01:12:26.480you know and i i think older when you get older too you start to calm down a bit at least i don't
01:12:32.120know about sammy but with me yeah he honestly like i couldn't believe he he talked he had a
01:12:38.480very different experience as you know because he he yeah he was murdering a lot of people
01:12:42.560and he talked to us about the story the first the first murder he committed and it was someone he
01:12:48.240knew it was someone he was like kind of close to we actually pulled the clip um i'll play it it's
01:12:54.740out five because i never thought about killing people um but uh i went through with it we did it
01:13:03.880uh one night we went out to after hour clubs we got in the car about four o'clock in the morning
01:13:11.040and as we drove away i shot him in the back of the head twice i didn't feel any remorse i didn't
01:13:17.880feel anything. And I thought that was peculiar. I thought either something's wrong with me or I'm0.92
01:13:26.540just a stone cold killer. And I'm going to fit in the mafia perfectly.
01:13:32.900Such an interesting man. And I asked him, Mike, do you ever think about God, heaven, judgment?
01:14:11.540who is so analytical brilliant and he asked me you know he he delved he said Michael how did you
01:14:17.780do certain things that you did and I said well you know Jordan uh I didn't feel good about it
01:14:23.980I said but I knew I had to do it so I would kind of step outside of myself and handle what I had
01:14:30.820to handle very efficiently and then come back to who I was and Jordan looked at me and he says well
01:14:37.060how do you know who's the real you? And I said, whoa. I said, you know what, Jordan? That's a
01:14:42.480good question. I never thought of that. But that's how I dealt with certain things that were
01:14:47.500uncomfortable for me to do. But the fact that you're able to do them, I don't know what that
01:14:53.240says, Megan, quite honestly. But, you know, the last thing that I was going to have anybody say
01:14:58.900about me was that I didn't perform or I didn't follow an order or I didn't do what I was supposed
01:15:03.780to do um so that's that's how I dealt with it differently than Sammy obviously but look there
01:15:11.440was guys in that life you know I say this all the time you talk about a Roy DeMeo I'm sure you heard
01:15:16.380his name maybe a Greg Scarpa yeah not good these were serial killers they were serial killers they
01:15:24.640would have been killers even if they weren't in the mafia the mafia didn't turn them into that
01:15:29.980That's who they were. You can't be that kind of person and say, well, the mob made me do it. No, you got to be that person. And obviously the experience might be enhanced because that's a lifestyle that things like that occur. But it didn't make you that way. That's who you were. And I think he just summed it up. He said, I'd be perfect for the mob. But this is, he figured that out, that this is who he was and he'd be a perfect guy to be in that life.
01:15:59.980for the listening audience, that was episode 352 from July of 2022. If you want to go back
01:16:05.660and listen to it, 352. So, so then, so you've been out of prison now by my count, some 30 years,
01:16:13.260you've maintained a life on the up and up, created a whole family, you're a motivational speaker.
01:16:19.960So what are, what are the big takeaways for you? You know, and you, you talk to people in these
01:16:25.800motivational speeches when you talk to your grandkids, like what are the biggest things
01:16:30.100you've learned from this life? Well, you know, when you're determined and you have the right
01:16:36.680support, you know, the right people around you. And obviously for me, it's, it's also a faith
01:16:41.960issue. You can come out of a bad situation. It's not easy. And, you know, I may have had an
01:16:47.680advantage because like I said, I surrounded myself with the right people. And, um, but I think the
01:16:53.740message that resonates all the time, and I've done probably over 2,000 speaking engagements,
01:17:00.100is that if I came out of a tough situation, you can also. And that's what people want to hear.
01:17:06.960They love a redemption story. Many people are struggling out there, and it doesn't matter what
01:17:11.940walk of life. I've spoken to the most affluent people, and then obviously people that are in
01:17:17.120almost poverty-stricken themselves. And everybody is struggling with something,
01:17:21.860and they want to know how to overcome it.
01:17:24.500And I think my story resonates in that regard
01:17:27.380because people do believe you don't walk away from that life
01:17:30.160without entering a witness protection program
01:17:32.140and going through the whole, you know, ordeal that you have to go through.
01:17:35.660And the fact that I was able to do that, you know, raise a family,
01:17:39.260have a wife and children, have a career and a profession,
01:18:46.120I mean, the mafia was really undermined by prosecutors like Rudy Giuliani, but it's not gone.
01:18:53.620So how do you how is it today? Do you know? And, you know, what's its status?
01:18:59.820Well, I can tell you, you know, I always say this, the golden years of Cosa Nostra mafia in this country, really from the late 40s, early 50s, right through to the mid 80s, when, again, we know what happened.
01:19:09.820And, you know, there was a time when I was in New York, Daily News, New York Post, New York Times, Newsday, every single day or every other day story about the mob.
01:19:21.400Without a doubt, one family or another who's getting busted every other day.
01:19:25.900Now I read the New York Post every morning, maybe every six months.
01:19:29.360And as a matter of fact, I think last week 10 guys got busted or something like that.
01:21:00.620But, you know, many of us remember what he did in New York and how he behaved after 9-11 and what kind of a mayor he was and factor all of that in and sizing up his legacy.
01:21:55.500I've been out of New York for a while. I said, I want two things. I'd like a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee and let's go around Manhattan. I haven't seen it in a while. And I could not believe Times Square and how Rudy had cleaned it up. I mean, I grew up with that being Smut City. And I was like amazed that I said, wow, this guy really did do a job here.
01:22:14.960You know, so I was fascinated by that. You know, so that's to me, that's his legacy. I look at him as a prosecutor, the job that he did and and the mayor of New York. And of course, after 9-11, he was tremendous. So to me, that's how I remember him.
01:22:33.820thank you so much for telling your story and for finding a way forward and setting the example for
01:22:40.760others who have struggled in any number of ways all the best to you well megan thanks for having
01:22:47.220me and like i said i've been watching you since your days in fox and i appreciate uh just your
01:22:52.340honesty and the way you you know you you just carry yourself and break things out it's uh for
01:22:57.500me it's uh it's really a joy to see so thank you oh i'm flattered it's so nice to meet you to be
01:23:03.540continued we have a fascinating program for you today one filled with crime murder money and
01:23:14.300betrayal today we're talking to one of the most infamous mobsters in american history
01:23:18.920salvatore gravano otherwise known as sammy the bull to understand his story we have to take a
01:23:25.940step back in time to the early 1970s when the godfather hit the big screen and changed the
01:23:33.000perception of the mafia in america you spend time with your family sure i do good because a man who
01:23:41.500doesn't spend time with his family can never be a real man you look terrible i want you to eat
01:23:47.820i want you to rest well and a month from now this hollywood big shot's gonna give you what
01:23:53.420you want it's too late they start shooting in a week i'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse
01:23:59.600at about that same time gravano a kid who grew up without mob connections in his family
01:24:08.120slowly eased into la cosa nostra and made his first kill over the course of the next two decades
01:24:16.260sammy the bull would rise up the ranks of new york's notorious gambino crime family raking in
01:24:22.200millions upon millions of dollars and repeatedly killing he has admitted to 19 murders in all
01:24:28.780including his own brother-in-law his best friend and the gambino family mob boss paul castellano
01:24:36.100in 1985 deadly messages from organized crime to organized crime and the rest of society
01:24:42.240the murder of gambino crime family boss paul castellano yesterday or the 1979 assassination
01:24:48.240of cosa nostra don carmine galenti unsolved very public executions by an underworld that plays by
01:24:54.800their own rules and their own code of justice. The Castellano murder, particularly brazen and
01:25:00.540defiant, since Castellano was gunned down a day before, he was to resume standing trial for auto
01:25:06.040theft and murder. Organized crime had served up its own sentence. By the late 1980s, the new Don,
01:25:15.740John Gotti, had named Sammy the Bull his right hand man. Gotti himself was a ruthless mobster
01:25:22.260and media darling who dressed in expensive suits and enjoyed the finer things in life,
01:25:28.020earning him the nickname the Dapper Don. He also repeatedly escaped conviction with,
01:25:34.080as it would turn out, Sammy's help, which we'll get to, earning him another nickname,
01:25:39.740the Teflon Don. Remember how they use that about Donald Trump? Well, it was first
01:25:43.540about John Gotti. But in 1991, everything changed. John Gotti and Sammy the Bull were behind bars,
01:25:50.860facing a slew of charges when Sammy decided to flip and do the unthinkable, cooperate with the
01:25:58.260feds. At the time, he was the highest ranking gangster to break his blood oath, earning him
01:26:05.220the ire of mob aficionados who dubbed him a rat. Not since Joe Vellacci in the 60s has such a high
01:26:12.400ranking member of the mob turned traitor. Sammy the Bull Gravano now joins the ranks of those who
01:26:17.080have broken the cardinal rule of the mafia omerta the code of silence
01:26:21.220sammy's testimony helped send john goddy away for good the teflon is gone the don is covered
01:26:31.220with velcro and every charge in the indictment stuck and resulted in dozens of other mobsters
01:26:39.000going to prison as well one top fbi agent says that testimony by sammy led to the demise of
01:26:46.240organized crime in new york since then there have been numerous books and movies made about
01:26:51.140the gambino crime family and while some may still consider sammy a quote rat hundreds of thousands
01:26:57.140of people are curious fans of his subscribing to his podcast launched right around the time our
01:27:05.300own did uh called our thing which is what cosa nostra means in fact his youtube channel alone
01:28:43.060But he thought that he would have the lawyers back up those tapes and turn around in a way to say, well, you hear John complaining about him.
01:34:23.200And now I'm doing a whole bunch of other things.
01:34:25.800And a lot of I was reading and preparing for this. A lot of men and women in law enforcement, in particular, FBI agents watch and listen to the podcast and the YouTube show because they say it's fascinating.
01:34:39.800fascinating. They've never been able to get this sort of an insight into a real life mobsters
01:34:45.440thinking. And you talk openly about the crimes that were committed by yourself, by others.
01:34:50.920A lot of these guys who were covering you or on you back then are listening, thinking, oh,
01:34:54.540my God, this is helping me put things together. So it's just the all around you. Obviously,
01:34:59.900you have immunity now for those crimes, given the deal you struck with the government. But
01:35:03.460it's a fascinating thing to think about the FBI agents who once tracked you and guys you worked
01:35:09.140with now listening to you and are fans of the show. I mean, actually fans of the show. So let
01:35:14.780me pause you there and let's go back. Let's start with you as a kid, because as I mentioned in the
01:35:19.600intro, you were not raised in a family where your dad was in the mob and your granddad was in the
01:35:26.240mob. This was not foretold. As I understand it, your dad was fairly successful. You had a nice
01:35:32.200family and you had some difficulties as a child, but it wasn't related to anything in terms of
01:35:39.000crime or the mob no my mother and father were totally legitimate my mother was a seamstress
01:35:46.020my father was a painter he got back then they used to use lead in paint got lead poisoning
01:35:52.240had to stay away from painting my mother got an offer from a jewish contractor she would go and0.80
01:35:58.800make the clothes women's clothes and uh the guy told her katie you're great open up a little0.83
01:36:06.400factory and i'll get you work if you could produce you know the quality of work that you do0.85
01:36:13.040uh we'll give you our work and that's exactly what she did my father jumped in with her to help her
01:36:22.320and they worked together they had a dress factory and uh that's what they did i had two sisters
01:36:29.240neither one of them had anything to do with the mafia boyfriends or anything one of my
01:36:36.140brother-in-law's was an engineer uh the other brother-in-law was uh a plumbing contractor
01:36:42.560later on he became in the mafia with me he became a made member but before that before i was in the
01:36:50.160mafia i had no relation to the mafia whatsoever but in bensonhurst brooklyn it was saturated with
01:36:57.460the mafia so it was on every street corner it was around as a kid growing up i was dyslexic
01:37:03.940I didn't do good in school. I got left back in the fourth grade, the seventh grade.
01:37:08.460I had nothing but problems in school. I got thrown out.
01:37:13.540I never got past the eighth grade and I was in a gang and we stayed away from the mafia.
01:37:19.820We knew who they were. We knew they were dangerous. So we stayed away from them.
01:37:24.840It was us against the world and we didn't want nothing to do with the mafia.
01:37:29.240um and at 19 years old i got drafted and i went into the military during the vietnam war
01:37:37.120i spent two years there and uh yeah when you were drafted you got two years if you join
01:37:44.900you had to do three i did two i came out and went right back into a gang
01:37:50.780why why because i would think i would like to think that a couple years in the army
01:37:57.260would instill a moral code in you that would give you some pause
01:38:01.180about going back into a life of crime?
01:38:45.360So I think the whole thing was bullshit.1.00
01:38:48.360So I went right back into the into a gang.0.98
01:38:53.580But unbeknownst to me, while the two years I was gone, most of my friends hooked up with different mafia families and they were hooked up with somebody.
01:39:03.060One of my friends, Tommy Spiro, said, my uncle wants to talk to you.
01:49:58.660and i had no intention of committing or my crimes to talk to him i i was asked that once by a priest
01:50:08.840and i told him yeah you want me to tell you my what i do tell me what you do and then i'll talk
01:50:16.360to you about what i do so i i don't believe in religion i believe in god but i think religion0.96
01:50:24.780is bullshit i think it's they it's all about money it's all about different things they commit0.97
01:50:32.780evil things to to good people so i i you know i'm i'm away from religions i respected the indian0.99
01:50:40.480religion the wicca religion it stunned me it's the only religion that they put a woman above god0.99
01:50:48.640the goddess of the moon the water and the earth god is the god of the forest and the mountains
01:50:55.720why do they put i asked a woman above god because she creates life she needs a man's seed but she
01:51:07.900in her womb takes care of life and then gives birth and creates life i understand that i'm
01:51:16.540somebody with common sense if you make sense to me in a certain way i understand it so i understood
01:51:23.460that religion now a lot of people will not be happy with me saying this but they of course it's
01:51:30.920a it's a they call it a pagan religion they call it all kinds of things it was before the
01:51:35.460christianity even and uh i understand that part about a woman giving birth and creating life
01:51:44.640Well, I mean, I've I've I've read that, unlike some in the mob, you you were very you were a family man in the midst of all this.
01:51:55.980You went home and had dinner with your wife and your two kids each night.
01:52:00.380Your daughter, Karen, has talked about that publicly many times.
01:52:04.000And so there has been this respect for your family members, for your wife, for your daughter in a way that even the people who were in the mob said, you know, for example, John Gotti would go out.
01:52:14.280carousing with other women after hours and you would go home to your family that piece of that
01:52:20.360piece of your commitment of your life you know you honored um despite what was happening on the
01:52:25.460other front and i know that you you don't see these as as real as murders you know in the same
01:52:31.280way a soldier doesn't commit a murder when he kills somebody this is how an fbi agent explained
01:52:35.120it in one public interview that a soldier would not be murdering you don't see your kills as
01:52:41.240murders because there was a code behind them because you say the people you killed had sort
01:52:46.680of agreed to live by this code and die by this code and on that on that note uh that heavy note
01:52:54.440let me pause it okay because i want to get into that next and that's a that's a whole other
01:52:58.060chapter for us so stand by let me squeeze in a commercial break and much much more
01:53:02.260with sammy the bull gravano as he stays with us for the whole show fascinating story to tell
01:53:12.160So, Sammy, it was actually a quote that I was reading, not from an FBI agent.
01:53:16.300It was from Terrence Winter, who the audience may know as the executive producer of The Sopranos.
01:53:52.460You know, I watched the program one time during World War Two.
01:53:58.300We dropped an atom bomb, an atomic bomb, an atom bomb twice, not once, twice.
01:54:05.380but i saw the guy who was in the plane and over hiroshima or somewhere and he pressed the button
01:54:15.140and it killed a hundred thousand people men women and children in a split second
01:54:22.580and they were patting him on the back that he did a great job the war was ended early because of
01:54:29.960those things. And if I was talking to the guy, I would say, listen, you did a great job. Great
01:54:37.620military guy. You fought for the country. You did what you were supposed to do. How do you feel
01:54:44.440now, knowing you just killed 100,000 people, men, women, and children? Does that bother you at all?
01:54:53.320And I'm sure he would tell me no. Because he was fighting for the country. He was fighting
01:54:59.820for what he thought was right in the mafia it's part of it's not a gang no more it's part of my
01:55:06.280heritage it came from italy sicily it started in sicily and it came to this country so it's part
01:55:15.140of my heritage so it's not just a gang a gang is you know killing in a gang or doing certain things
01:55:23.640for a drug spot is a different thing but this is a soldier it was explained to me i was involved
01:55:30.800in the johnny keys hit it was a major major hit and it was he was a a guy who had 50 hits under
01:55:39.720his belt and me and him were gonna go at each other and it was explained to me that we were
01:55:48.580like two samurais now i understand a samurai is a different thing than us they're actually more
01:55:54.960violent than us but i really felt that way that we were two samurais who met on the battlefield
01:56:05.220what about can i let me ask you a couple follow-ups on that so obviously when we when we
01:56:11.200dropped the bomb at the end of world war ii they estimated that we saved somewhere upwards of 25
01:56:16.78030 million lives by putting an end to World War II when the Japanese would not surrender.0.92
01:56:23.880And so, you know, I'm not defending the killing of 100,000 people exactly, but in a way I am0.99
01:56:30.820because it was the right decision. It saved far more lives than it actually cost. But in the
01:56:35.680mafia, and I can get it if the guy was going to kill you. Let me answer your question. Let me
01:56:39.160answer that question the people who say that it saved 25 to 30 million lives was who the government
01:56:47.440of course they're going to say that i mean independent analysts to take a look who have
01:56:52.980taken a look at this ad nauseum since the end of world war ii will tell you that the the lives
01:56:57.900saved far far outnumbered the lives cost doesn't make it not controversial um but you can't talk
01:57:05.680about it without adding that perspective. But I mean, the thing about the mafia, and I can
01:57:09.760understand if a guy was going to kill you, I mean, even the law recognizes, maybe not exactly the way
01:57:16.020that you would do it, but what recognizes a right to self-defense. But, you know, it seems like it
01:57:21.840was a whole criminal justice system that you guys agreed to, where, you know, you sleep with the0.95
01:57:26.260guy's wife, you could get whacked. You interfere with my business, you could get whacked. It0.98
01:57:30.640basically is just whatever the head of the crime family wants and the guy doesn't show up like a
01:57:37.360samurai face to face in a meeting where you fight it out to the death he just gets in the car with
01:57:41.820you he gets whacked in the back of the head so i'm interested in the moral you know the way you
01:57:47.140thought about those kind of differences morally well morally i i don't know if it's it to me0.87
01:57:54.940If it makes a difference, if you kill somebody on a battlefield or you kill somebody in the car or whether you use a gun or whether you use a knife or whether you use poison, that is that you just took a life.
01:58:09.240It doesn't matter how you take it. You can beat somebody to death. You couldn't fight. You could win a fight. You can go overboard and just beat this person to death.0.90
01:58:18.540so you just took a life no matter how it is whether it's more gory about the means okay
01:58:26.380you're talking about the means yeah the means of how you're doing it i don't know if it makes
01:58:31.480any difference now they want to take guns away from everybody because there's a a shooting i mean0.73
01:58:38.700if there's not a shooting you want to take guns away from everybody you get some sicko so he goes0.95
01:58:44.100in with a bomb and he blows half the school up and he kills more people actually than0.79
01:58:50.200he's using a gun, does that make you happy that you didn't have a gun?
01:58:55.140So I don't think the means of what you use is that important.
01:59:00.580You're taking a life, whatever it is, whatever your reason is, whatever the senses look at
01:59:07.080later on, you're taking a life, whether it's on a battlefield, in the street, no matter
01:59:12.900how you do it or what you do you're taking a life bottom line but we have excuses for what
01:59:20.560how you do it if me and him were in a battlefield in the street we like years ago and we back up
01:59:27.920and we pull out a gun from the side and we both shoot at each other you're taking a life what's
01:59:33.020the difference how you do it that is dead my brother-in-law had a good saying you get hit by
01:59:39.380a car and you're all crunched up, bleeding, all your bones are busted up and you're dying.
01:59:46.840How would you feel if the person ran over and said, it's me, Sammy?
02:00:09.380I don't know. That ignores them. That ignores the moral code. I mean, I agree with you in terms of, you know, you die by a knife, you die by a gun. It doesn't make much of a difference to you. But we're expanding beyond that, too. The the law recognizes some some killings as justified. It would not recognize any of the ones that you're talking about as justified.
02:00:30.800And I think you know that. It's just what you're saying is that in the mafia, you live by a different code of justice. And and it's as I understand it, your position is that you wouldn't run around killing what you call legitimate people. It's you know, if somebody pissed you off in your social life, he wouldn't be at risk of getting whacked.
02:00:51.820you only, for the most part, and we'll get to one of the exceptions I know about, but
02:00:56.660it sounds like it may have been an accident, but for the most part, you only went after people who
02:01:01.680were part of your world and who had agreed to live and die by this code. Right, exactly. I never
02:01:10.460killed a woman or a child, and I never killed even a legitimate guy who I didn't get along with or
02:01:18.080whatever i i mean i had fights but that's as far as that would go i'm not going to kill somebody
02:01:23.820because i don't like what he said or something like that we're not complete lunatics some of us
02:01:29.340became lunatics but i'm i never i mean i never went to that degree i i lived by this code
02:01:36.800and i i would willing to die by the code i told my family when i cooperated we talked about
02:01:44.440cooperating when i cooperated i said if somebody comes down and kills me don't don't don't even be
02:01:49.560mad don't say nothing don't do anything don't be mad i broke the code i understood that i could
02:01:55.920die for what i was doing if i could understand it you understand it leave it alone so i i believe
02:02:03.240in that code just like i believe in god but i don't believe in certain religions probably most
02:02:09.600religions but um you know you gotta live by something and i live by what i was taught by
02:02:17.740my mother and my father the legitimate and a lot of people who would say i was a different
02:02:22.780kind of gangsters you talked about the law enforcement i'm still friends with agents
02:02:28.600mypd cops till today because they were they were different we got along we were friends they had
02:02:37.440one life. I had another life. We understood each other. And I was basically a different kind of a
02:02:44.560gangster. I cared about people. I'm a people's person, basically. My ex-wife and my daughter
02:02:52.580or my son will say, Dad, you talk to everybody. Yeah. They're human beings. I talk to people.
02:02:57.640I love people. I like hardworking people. But what about Alan Kaiser? This was a 16-year-old
02:03:05.100boy who you killed and i understand you know it was accidental no no it was it was it's not
02:03:12.500accidental and i didn't kill first of all there was a gang who came and they actually did movies
02:03:18.920about this some hour after hour club bikers and and they and i went to that place i wound up getting
02:03:26.180a beating they got i got jumped by six seven guys my ankle was broke on both sides i had a cast from
02:03:33.800my knee down and i had permission to go after this guy and it wasn't alan kaiser so i'll tell
02:03:41.100you what happened we got in the car and we were looking for him one night we saw him pull up in
02:03:47.280front of a different guy a different guy aldo candido yes yes and i said that's him we went
02:03:54.320back to our club we got guns we got a shotgun now it was supposed to be loaded with double o buck
02:10:26.480Now that blood was drawn, these will never be the same again.
02:10:31.900Okay, so that was the bulk of that clip is Karen Gravano, Sammy's daughter, who was one of the stars of the show Mob Wives, which I confess I absolutely loved.
02:10:42.900And she was very open about what it was like to grow up as your daughter and sort of when she how she slowly became aware of what you did for a living and how she could tell.
02:10:55.040you know obviously she's fiery and feisty but how she could sort of tell that you were an important
02:11:00.520man you know the way people greeted you the way people showed you respect and i know you know
02:11:06.280that must have manifested in your life too you're sort of getting into the clubs in new york and
02:11:10.920i saw the abc documentary where you know you talked about you looked at the manhattan skyline
02:11:16.840and said you know i own this i own it i built it i control it so can you talk to us a little bit
02:11:22.080about that piece of your history? Yeah, well, you know, I became very powerful in the construction
02:11:30.200industry. And one day we were on the other side in Connecticut, I believe it is. And we were in a
02:11:37.760fancy hotel and we went out, I went out on the patio and smoking a cigar, I think. And I looked
02:11:44.700at the skyline at night manhattan is gorgeous lit up at night and it just the guy who was with me
02:11:52.220said what are you looking at i said look at this look at the beauty here it's it's it's absolutely
02:11:57.320stunning it's gorgeous and uh i'm part of building this whole thing i mean you can't get a job at
02:12:05.740this point in my life without some sort of a wink and a nod from me saying yes or no i mean i became
02:12:13.400very powerful in the construction industry paul had me paul castellano had me under his wing
02:12:19.400because he loved construction and um he was part of the reason i became very powerful in the
02:12:26.340construction industry and he enjoyed using me to run certain unit unions and do certain things for
02:12:34.000him and um yeah i i loved uh what i was doing as far as the construction and i should i should
02:12:41.980mentioned because you mentioned paul castellano so because you had sort of started with a different
02:12:46.040crime family and then eventually moved over to the gambino crime family and that's the family
02:12:49.980that paul castellano for a time was the head of and you would later become part of his assassination
02:12:55.400um but before before before we get to that um so you're living large you're living large in new
02:13:02.060york and this was a time i mean what it's a weird question but like to what extent did that film
02:13:06.820the godfather affect people's view of the mafia and your own experience within the mafia you know
02:13:13.600because it when i was growing up you knew about the mafia but there there definitely was a
02:13:17.620glorification around it you know it seemed like oh they hurt people but maybe mostly their own
02:13:22.640people but that's not really true i mean the extortion was on regular folks too um and yet
02:13:28.580they seem kind of cool and people wanted to like rub elbows with them in very high circles there
02:13:33.800speculation about frank sinatra and you know so on and so forth so what was your experience of that
02:13:38.720movie and people's reaction to the mob well that movie stunned me it was probably one of the best
02:13:47.340movies i ever watched uh it was completely well done uh godfather one and godfather two godfather
02:13:55.860three was a joke but yeah because you were in it when this was coming out you were you were in it
02:14:00.480when those movies hit yeah yeah and it it you know it showed the family orientation how we are
02:14:08.600with family the weddings our family my family had weddings like that and people would get up
02:14:15.280and sing and it was fun and uh you know uh who was it sonny is with one of the bridesmaids in a
02:14:24.100in a room upstairs i mean that's typical of us that was really typical of us all that stuff that
02:14:30.860happened in that uh the the agents watching us and it just gave me a whole different look at the mob
02:14:40.180and how the people would look at it and as far as the fascination i know what it is everybody0.99
02:14:46.400Everybody in my mind anyway, has a fascination, especially men, have a fascination of being a tough guy, going with beautiful women, beautiful cars, making money, you know, fuck the government.0.95
02:15:01.940I don't want to pay taxes and I don't want to do this and that.0.89
02:15:04.540So everybody looked at it and it's you didn't live that life, but you admired it in a way.
02:15:13.240You felt a certain way when you watched it.
02:15:16.220And I watched this new movie that came out, The Offer,
02:19:28.760Her husband knew she was beautiful. He'll tell her, go right past Sandy's Club. Don't worry about it. He said that because he knew she was safe. We wouldn't let nothing happen to her. Around the block, only God knows what happens.
02:23:00.180We went to a bakery, a fruit and vegetable store.
02:23:03.940Those things don't even exist anymore.
02:23:05.960But you guys, you didn't charge people for security saying no, no, not security.
02:23:11.460Never. Well, something that I mean, I remember I have some personal knowledge on this because in another life before I was a journalist, I was a lawyer.
02:23:17.720and the lawyer I worked for at this law firm, Jones Day,
02:23:21.620was charged with enforcing a consent decree
02:23:24.080that the mob had entered into in New York City
02:23:26.600and that meant the mob admitted it had done a bunch of things
02:23:29.300and we were responsible for making sure it lived up to its promise
02:23:33.980And, you know, sort of the harassment of small businesses,
02:23:37.680small business owners was on the list.
02:23:39.740Money laundering and so on, that was another thing.
02:23:41.960But, you know, this sort of smaller crime,
02:23:44.420smaller than murders and so on within the family,
02:23:46.400that's that's one of the reasons why people don't like the mafia right like it's not all within your
02:23:52.960own family there are innocent people who get hurt and who have to pay unnecessary money that they
02:23:58.360shouldn't have to pay and who could get hurt if they don't do as is as told well listen i like i
02:24:04.000said before you know there's good and bad in every organization and there's bad guys in the mafia who
02:24:08.980would do something like that do a lot of things like that that wasn't our norm now i would do
02:24:14.640that with a disco or something to protect when you talk about protection money if you can mention
02:24:20.360my name nobody could come in and bother you mafia wise or any any other way i'll take care of your
02:24:28.300problems but i didn't cripple them they gave me a pay or they gave me something that helped them
02:24:34.180i don't look at it as hurting them shaking them down it's like a rent it's like anything else
02:24:40.140that or any bill that you pay. And in most cases that I did, it was a reasonable pay.
02:24:47.320What I did mostly is use my power to help grow a company and I would become their partner.
02:24:54.640I'll give you a quick example. There was a guy who had a small little container company.
02:24:59.360He'd go to houses and put the container, you're moving, you put all your garbage in that container
02:25:04.660and he's making money. The containers were garbage. And I got to like the guy. I went0.98
02:25:10.200to him and I said, listen, I got connections in Jersey. I can get the best containers and
02:25:17.720I could increase your business. So we had a conversation. I said, I don't want any contracts
02:25:24.340or anything like that. We could work on a handshake. How much do you make a year? And
02:25:29.580he said, about $100,000 a year. I said, how amount
02:25:33.480we go partners? The first $100,000 you make, that's yours.
02:25:37.620That's what you make. Anything above that, me and you are partners
02:25:41.440and I could get you more work. I could get you better containers.
02:25:45.500So we did that. We shook hands and we did that. At the end of
02:25:49.400the year of our partnership, I says, how did we do?
02:25:53.260What did you make? He says, Sammy, I made $400,000 this year.
02:25:56.880all right the first hundred thousand is yours the other three hundred thousand but the allegation
02:26:02.820the allegation against you by your critics is that nobody should have accepted this kind of
02:26:09.660an offer from you because if they wanted to renegotiate or if they wanted a bigger piece
02:26:14.860of the pie you would kill them no it's not true that is not true i've never killed a partner
02:26:21.440And listen, what we're talking about happened 40, 50 years ago.
02:26:27.500And if you came to my office, I'll show you 14, 15 different letters of people who were partners with me and knew me back then are sending me love letters.
02:40:28.060He never offered me money under the table or doing anything, but he gave me this card for my grandchildren.
02:40:35.040And a matter of fact, as soon as I'm done with this conversation, I'm going to get in touch with him and I'm going to tell him that you're here asking me questions.
02:40:45.460Yeah, well, no, I mean, your kids talk about you in this way.
02:40:49.420It's part of what makes you fascinating, the dichotomy between your professional life and your home life.
02:40:55.800And up next in our last segment together, I want to get into turning on Gotti, going into witness protection in your job that you did while that happened, plastic surgery, and then how you wound up back in prison and then free again.
02:41:12.700OK, so don't miss that. Stay with us for one more segment as Sammy the Bull Gravano continues with us right after this quick break.
02:41:18.400my team's bitch has been looking into the james khan thing during the break and says0.96
02:41:25.240indeed uh andy mush russo part of the uh uh colombo crime family was a longtime friend0.93
02:41:33.660of james khan and at one point james khan did indeed offer to post mush's bail money when he
02:41:38.500was accused of a crime and this andy mush russo was indeed godfather to one of james khan's
02:43:09.120It was up there for months, but we didn't use the apartment.
02:43:12.040A lot of times when we did use the apartment, we didn't talk about anything.
02:43:16.440There was a couple of times that I wasn't in the apartment and he was sitting with Frankie LaCasio.0.97
02:43:25.460Now, when people talk about it was all bullshit, I mean, it's made up.0.89
02:43:32.380There's agents, New York State Organized Crime Task Force that heard these tapes, listened to the tapes and knew exactly what was going on.0.98
02:43:43.220But I'm going to give you one story that's going to blow all that other stuff away.
02:43:50.820The judge got rid of our lawyers, Jerry Shargell and Bruce Cutler, and we had to get new lawyers.
02:43:58.080One of the lawyers that we brought in did an interview and you could check this out in an article with Jerry Capici.
02:44:06.240He did an interview with Jerry Capici and told him this.
02:44:11.020I was brought in to be the lawyer for John.
02:44:15.340And he told John I was in that meeting.