Valuetainment - Undercover FBI Agent in the Gambino Family Takes Down 32 Mobsters

00:00:00.000 I was born in Cuba, and I posed as an Italian.

00:00:03.360 I paid off the mob guys, and just things started happening and growing.

00:00:07.740 Before I knew it, I was driving the captain of the Gambino crime family around.

00:00:11.720 Very colorful character by the name of Greg DePalma.

00:00:14.440 What point did you know your job as an FBI agent you were hooked on saying,

00:00:17.940 this is exactly what I thought it was going to be?

00:00:20.180 You know, it was immediately.

00:00:21.500 Just that whole movement of being an undercover and fooling people

00:00:25.380 to believing the person you're trying to portray.

00:00:27.880 Well, undercover became my home.

00:00:30.240 Greg DePalma is the guy who appeared in that famous photograph

00:00:33.340 with Frank Sinatra, Carlo Gambino.

00:00:36.300 Was he like a real, real mafioso where his loyalty was to La Cosa Nostra over family,

00:00:41.900 where he followed the code to the T?

00:00:43.760 Was he known as somebody like that?

00:00:45.320 He had a big mouth.

00:00:46.380 That was great for the FBI.

00:00:47.840 He loved to talk, we loved to listen.

00:00:49.640 He's looking for ways to exploit you.

00:00:51.420 That's what he does with everybody.

00:00:53.000 Is there a training for that?

00:00:54.560 Meaning, is more caught or taught?

00:00:56.820 They're out there committing crimes as kids.

00:00:58.900 Then they wound up going to jail.

00:01:01.040 But jail is like going to Oxford.

00:01:02.920 In the mob is total accountability as to where you're at, why you're doing this.

00:01:08.760 Is that his DNA or is that the DNA of La Cosa Nostra where they're always looking at,

00:01:12.480 how can I get more money of this guy in front of me?

00:01:14.300 Yes, absolutely.

00:01:15.340 That is the DNA with that.

00:01:16.840 Money in the mob always flows up.

00:01:18.820 It never flows down.

00:01:20.100 It's all about making money.

00:01:21.680 You think that part can ever change?

00:01:23.140 They're nothing but criminals.

00:01:24.600 That's all they are.

00:01:25.440 My guest today is Jack Garcia, a.k.a. Jack Falcone, who was an undercover FBI agent, 26 years,

00:01:36.820 of which 24 years he was undercover.

00:01:40.440 And for many different projects that he had, whether it was going against the Russian mob,

00:01:45.840 I think the Asian mob, he did stuff with Colombians, he did stuff with the Mexican cartel.

00:01:49.720 But his biggest story that ended up being a book nowadays that many people have read is

00:01:55.640 him playing the undercover, you know, guy that's running a business out of Florida that

00:02:02.900 comes to New York.

00:02:04.200 And eventually one of the couples from the Gambino family takes a liking into him.

00:02:08.880 He gets into the family, is there for three years.

00:02:11.000 Three years later, he penetrates the Gambino family, ends up arresting 32 mobsters, convictions

00:02:16.560 of 32 mobsters, including the top members of the post-John Gotti Gambino crime family.

00:02:23.160 With that being said, Jack Garcia, thank you so much for being against somebody, Damon.

00:02:26.860 Oh, thank you for having me.

00:02:28.260 What an honor.

00:02:28.960 Thank you.

00:02:29.200 So did I miss anything there?

00:02:30.840 Did anything?

00:02:31.820 I know you got a lot of awards.

00:02:32.880 I know you've done a lot of great work.

00:02:33.980 I know FBI loves you for the service that you did.

00:02:35.860 Did I miss any part of this story when I went through it?

00:02:38.660 Well, the main part that you missed, Patrick, was the fact that I was born in Cuba and I

00:02:44.280 posed as an Italian.

00:02:45.520 That's something that at first I didn't even believe that I could pull it off, but I did.

00:02:49.780 That's the crazy part.

00:02:50.780 That's the crazy part.

00:02:51.760 So let's get right into it.

00:02:53.280 First of all, just so everybody knows, you're somebody that came up.

00:02:59.300 I mean, your story, you watched the movie Serpico and then you were inspired, that kind

00:03:05.140 of inspired you to want to get into the world.

00:03:06.840 So why don't you tell us a little about your upbringing on how you went to the FBI?

00:03:10.980 All right.

00:03:11.240 I was born in Cuba.

00:03:12.240 Actually, I lived under communism, under Fidel, for about three years before we were able

00:03:18.760 to leave in 1961.

00:03:21.360 And when we came here, we didn't speak a word of English.

00:03:24.700 And my father had a job in New York, actually at three, in order to get us, you know, that

00:03:31.320 this was going to be a temporary hold, that we were going to go back to Cuba when this Banana

00:03:36.100 Republic was over.

00:03:37.160 Well, needless to say, that Banana Republic is still there.

00:03:40.760 So we decided to stay in America, learn English, and then I went on going to a school up in

00:03:47.940 Washington Heights, New York.

00:03:49.820 And then we moved to the Bronx where I went to a Catholic school.

00:03:53.360 And there's where I started playing football.

00:03:55.040 And I had the opportunity to get several scholarships and went to the University of Richmond.

00:04:00.480 And it was there where I saw the movie Serpico.

00:04:03.520 And I knew that that moment in time, I wanted to be into law enforcement.

00:04:09.660 It was kind of like a cool guy, you know, Al Pacino, long hair, beard, had the pretty girl

00:04:15.080 with the motorcycle and an old sheep English dog to add to that.

00:04:19.720 So I said, this is what I want to do.

00:04:21.360 But unfortunately, back in the 70s, nobody was hiring and the FBI refused to return my

00:04:27.060 call.

00:04:27.760 So what happened in 1976 or so, or the end of 75, I was watching Univision and I saw this

00:04:36.560 American non-native Spanish speaking FBI agent saying they were looking for Spanish speakers

00:04:43.280 in the Bureau.

00:04:44.140 So I called the Bureau right away and I said, look, you got me, you got my application.

00:04:48.800 I'm ready to go.

00:04:49.700 Oh, I meet the bill.

00:04:50.940 They got back to me and said, well, you're not an American citizen.

00:04:54.720 So I became an American citizen, which is one of the most proud moments of my life.

00:04:59.160 And then I told them, I said, now I have it.

00:05:01.520 Let's get this going.

00:05:02.620 And in 1980, I became a special agent of the FBI.

00:05:07.280 Now, let me ask you this.

00:05:08.300 Prior to that, what were you doing before you became a special agent?

00:05:11.900 Well, because I couldn't land a job in the police department, I wound up working in some

00:05:15.980 colleges as director of testing.

00:05:18.020 Then I got involved.

00:05:19.560 I actually got into the police department at Union County Prosecutor's Office, but it

00:05:24.540 was short lived.

00:05:25.400 I was only there about a year.

00:05:27.220 And then the FBI came calling.

00:05:29.000 And of course, the rest is the dream of my life job.

00:05:33.960 I love it.

00:05:34.360 I love the fact that it is the dream of your life job.

00:05:36.480 Now, Jack, if I was in high school with you, who were you in high school?

00:05:39.700 We're in 10th grade, 11th grade.

00:05:41.160 Who was Jack Falcone?

00:05:42.260 Well, at first, Jack Falcone, he's always a jovial guy.

00:05:47.720 You know, I break balls.

00:05:49.140 I like hanging around with a bunch of the guys, have fun.

00:05:53.240 I played sports.

00:05:54.800 I didn't have a weight issue like I developed later in my bureau career.

00:05:58.820 So I'm always an outgoing social person.

00:06:02.160 So I was not a bully, but I actually protected those who, you know, that were bullied.

00:06:08.340 And and that was the kind of guy people kind of gravitated to me because of my size.

00:06:13.420 I was this big mama Luke, six, four.

00:06:16.140 Back then I was around 240, 250.

00:06:18.960 And, you know, it was some kind of guy that people gravitate to.

00:06:23.500 Makes sense.

00:06:24.340 So you bullied bullies is what you did.

00:06:26.460 That is correct.

00:06:27.420 OK, and that that apparently didn't change for the rest of your life.

00:06:30.220 You enjoy bullying bullies.

00:06:31.840 Well, I guess.

00:06:32.820 Yeah.

00:06:33.100 So you're right.

00:06:34.320 Interesting.

00:06:34.880 OK, so now you go you go into the FBI.

00:06:37.260 You got your dream job.

00:06:38.180 You're excited about it.

00:06:40.260 At what point do you get some of these assignments that leads you to working with the mob?

00:06:47.320 How soon did you get a big assignment?

00:06:49.700 Well, keep in mind that Hoover died in the in 72.

00:06:53.980 So the bureau did not really mirror the demographics in our society.

00:06:58.020 So here I come in, this kid who speaks Spanish fluently.

00:07:02.340 The kid doesn't look like an FBI agent.

00:07:04.640 I didn't look your typical guy or dress the like.

00:07:07.320 I grew up in Havana.

00:07:08.800 I was grew up in Washington Heights in the Bronx.

00:07:11.380 So I had a little something with it.

00:07:13.820 And right around that time, the FBI got involved in working narcotics, which is the early 80s.

00:07:19.640 So I was the perfect guy.

00:07:21.260 Here I am.

00:07:21.740 I speak Spanish fluently.

00:07:23.240 I know the streets.

00:07:24.380 I'm able to I'm a social person.

00:07:27.180 So I immediately started working cases that were involving narcotics.

00:07:32.000 And that's kind of where I I found my little niche in the FBI.

00:07:37.520 And and OK, so when that did take place, what was your first project that you got in?

00:07:43.220 And when it happened, was it kind of like you were a fiend saying I'm a hook?

00:07:47.240 I want to do more.

00:07:48.940 I'm in love with like at what point did you know your job as an FBI agent?

00:07:52.900 And you were hooked on saying this is exactly what I thought it was going to be.

00:07:57.020 You know, it was immediately I wound up working a long term national security case.

00:08:01.240 So I really can't discuss it.

00:08:02.980 You know, Patrick, and and I apologize for that.

00:08:05.380 But it was where I was working on the cover.

00:08:07.760 I was living on my own.

00:08:09.040 I had a fake identification just the way that cloak and dagger, just that whole movement of being an undercover

00:08:16.440 and fooling people to believing the person you're trying to portray.

00:08:21.160 It was just so enticing to me.

00:08:24.840 And it was became like my adrenaline drug.

00:08:27.900 It was something that I drew my high, my my this is what I want to do.

00:08:32.560 And I just couldn't wait to do it more.

00:08:35.040 And again, because there weren't that many people who spoke the language like I did.

00:08:40.000 I was a shoo-in.

00:08:41.280 So I just started growing from one case to the other.

00:08:44.340 Each were each case.

00:08:45.580 I looked as a challenge and I enjoyed working with the men and women in the FBI.

00:08:51.800 So it was a perfect fit.

00:08:53.580 It was my little niche.

00:08:55.320 Some guys are good, maybe working wiretaps, other goods in surveillance.

00:08:59.340 Well, undercover became my my home.

00:09:02.400 So at at what point after you became an FBI agent in 1980, did you get the call for

00:09:08.040 dealing going undercover with the mob?

00:09:10.540 Well, how many years later?

00:09:12.180 Oh, it was back.

00:09:13.100 The first time I got the call was in the year 2000, 2001, because, again, all my expertise

00:09:19.440 was working narcotics, either posing as a drug dealer, a transporter, a money launderer.

00:09:25.900 Then I started doing police corruption cases, murder for hires, Asian organizer.

00:09:30.840 So I was all over the map.

00:09:32.580 I'd never worked traditional organized crime.

00:09:35.820 Actually, it was all new to me because I here I am, you know, with my language skill.

00:09:41.180 This was my little place to go.

00:09:43.260 So I worked the Russian case.

00:09:45.020 And one of the agents in that Russian case said, listen, we are have a situation up in

00:09:50.360 the Bronx.

00:09:51.000 We have a strip club.

00:09:51.980 And that's being shaken down by some Albanians and some wise guy.

00:09:56.240 You interested.

00:09:57.240 So I said, well, what do you want me to do?

00:09:59.540 You know, and he said, well, we want you to go in there, maybe do some payoffs and see

00:10:05.440 where it takes us to.

00:10:06.720 We'll pretty much take the Albanians out.

00:10:09.200 Well, I said yes.

00:10:10.480 It was the latter part of my career.

00:10:12.260 And next thing you know, yes, I paid off the mob guys to keep the Albanians away.

00:10:17.600 And just things started happening and growing before I knew it.

00:10:21.840 I was driving the captain of the Gambino crime family around.

00:10:25.900 That's how it got started.

00:10:27.000 Got it.

00:10:27.820 And this is in 2000 when you're doing that.

00:10:30.140 This was 2002, 2000 is when I heard we may be doing this, but 2002, that Christmas time

00:10:38.640 is when I paid the mob guy to keep the Albanians away.

00:10:42.540 Did the strip club have anything to do with John A. Light?

00:10:46.080 Was he involved at all or no?

00:10:47.320 No, not Johnny A. Light, who was involved originally.

00:10:50.400 The captain of the crew that I infiltrated is a very colorful character by the name of

00:10:55.420 Greg DePalma.

00:10:56.660 Greg DePalma is the guy who appeared in that famous photograph with Frank Sinatra, Carlo Gambino

00:11:02.780 and the others.

00:11:04.440 Now, also, Greg DePalma was an owner of this club that feature all the headliners, Frank Sinatra,

00:11:12.200 Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Sonny and Cher.

00:11:15.340 The who's who back in the late 70s were playing at this mob owned joint.

00:11:20.920 So he was a quite known celebrity.

00:11:23.140 He had been in jail for shaking down scores, the famous nightclub in New York City that

00:11:29.800 Howard Stern made famous.

00:11:31.120 So when he came out, he reclaimed the strip club that we were working and said, this is

00:11:36.740 my strip club.

00:11:37.760 It's on record with me.

00:11:39.480 Whoever is here now, which was another Gambino, they wound up surrendering to him.

00:11:44.880 And at first, we were a little leery with Greg, because Greg is the kind of guy who's a big

00:11:50.040 talker.

00:11:50.840 He loved to talk and we in the FBI love to listen.

00:11:53.900 So it was like a perfect match.

00:11:55.600 We kind of hitched our wagon to him.

00:11:57.800 And next thing you know, like I said, I started becoming friendly with him.

00:12:01.640 I started seeing what he was doing.

00:12:03.960 I was trying to identify who the hierarchy of the Gambino, the post-John Gotti Gambino

00:12:08.820 organization was, and it really brought me into more of a going from a victim, somebody

00:12:15.500 paying money to keep the mobs away and the Albanians to now becoming one of them.

00:12:22.120 And that's how I wound up going there.

00:12:24.860 From that, I became I got put on record with them and I became an associate in the Gambino

00:12:29.920 crime family.

00:12:31.380 At what point did they start trusting you where they said, you know, like, was there a tipping

00:12:36.320 point?

00:12:36.760 Was there an event when they said, you know, this is no longer a friend of mine.

00:12:40.960 This this is somebody we want to make a friend of ours.

00:12:43.520 You know, at what point did that happen?

00:12:45.420 Well, very much.

00:12:46.300 It was life is all about timing, Patrick, as you know.

00:12:49.100 I mean, it just so happened that I filled the void.

00:12:52.460 Greg DePalma's son, who was also a made guy who tried to kill himself in prison, he lost

00:12:58.540 his son, his confidant, and I kind of became his son.

00:13:02.360 So I was at the right place at the right time.

00:13:05.080 And then he started really telling me a lot more of the past.

00:13:09.460 He started telling me about some of the issues that were happening in the Gambino crime family

00:13:13.780 as to who was moving for jockeying for power, who is getting straightened out, why this person

00:13:19.880 should be straightened out.

00:13:21.220 So all of that valuable intelligence was great help for the FBI.

00:13:25.640 So what happened is he just started making me part of his crew, but it was an exhaustive

00:13:31.120 operation.

00:13:32.040 I mean, this guy talking about it sounds like, well, it's kind of simple, but it was mentally

00:13:37.440 draining.

00:13:38.240 The fact that this man had so much demand.

00:13:41.080 I mean, I could remember one time I was working another caper down in Florida, my phone ring.

00:13:46.380 And at that time we had the next telephones and I hear his voice and he had this raspy voice,

00:13:52.560 kind of like a Robert Logia voice.

00:13:54.520 And he would say, Jackie, boy, pick up the phone.

00:13:57.700 So I was working on something.

00:13:59.200 I just let it go.

00:14:00.380 When I came home the next day, he cuts me in and he says, where were you yesterday?

00:14:06.020 I said, I was doing down in something in Florida.

00:14:08.340 So he said, when I called you, why didn't you answer?

00:14:10.720 I said, well, Greg, I was a little tied up.

00:14:12.200 He goes, don't you ever do that?

00:14:14.540 Because how do I know you weren't arrested?

00:14:17.140 How do I know you're not talking or wearing a wire right now?

00:14:20.400 So the mob, I learned something that they did not teach me in, uh, while preparing for

00:14:26.860 this case, that there is so much accountability for it.

00:14:30.360 It's not like when you're dealing with a bad guy, a drug dealer, and all of a sudden this

00:14:36.120 drug dealer is, you don't have to tell them where you have, where you've been, what you

00:14:40.620 do the week before in the mob is total accountability as to where you're at, why are you doing this?

00:14:47.960 But I also learned the hard way from then on that anytime he called, no matter what I was

00:14:53.400 doing, I was going to pick up, including when my mother-in-law passed away, I was at the wake

00:14:59.840 and sure enough, the phone goes off and it's Greg DePalma.

00:15:03.720 Now I could of course not tell him that I was at a wake because I could just imagine the boys

00:15:10.120 will come into and, and, you know, have my aunt and my wife's aunt say, well, how long have

00:15:15.200 you been in the FBI, you know?

00:15:17.000 So I didn't, but I went outside.

00:15:19.640 I took the phone that I want to take that call.

00:15:22.780 Absolutely not.

00:15:23.740 But I took that call because I knew would have set me back.

00:15:27.200 So this is the kind of thing that was with Greg.

00:15:29.940 He would call me sometimes at three in the morning, not just me, everyone in the crew.

00:15:34.440 And he says, Hey, you watching TNT Rio Bravo is on.

00:15:38.580 Oh, I love that movie.

00:15:40.020 John Wayne is great.

00:15:41.060 And I'm going, do I really need to hear this at three o'clock in the morning?

00:15:45.740 But that was almost a form of the phone call at 3am had nothing to do, but to find out your

00:15:51.500 level of loyalty to him.

00:15:53.160 Absolutely.

00:15:54.120 Got it.

00:15:54.720 Absolutely.

00:15:55.220 It was all about.

00:15:56.080 What do you think about that?

00:15:57.000 What do you think about that?

00:15:58.300 Like you, because, you know, when you work under somebody like that, it's, it's, you know,

00:16:04.000 it's, it's, it's, it comes with a price, right?

00:16:07.100 It comes with a price of constant nonstop accountability.

00:16:09.860 How did you process all of this of having to win the loyalty and the trust?

00:16:14.780 Well, I knew that that's part of the system.

00:16:17.040 That's part of Cosa Nostra.

00:16:18.840 That's what it's all about.

00:16:20.080 There is no lone wolves out there.

00:16:22.940 If you are on record and you're put on record and you are using, and you're flying under

00:16:28.820 that umbrella of protection of that particular family, you have to adhere to the rules.

00:16:37.240 You have to stay in contact because it's all about with them control.

00:16:41.240 You stay in contact.

00:16:42.820 They know if you're making money, if you're making money, you're kicking up money because

00:16:47.420 as you know, Patrick money in the mob always flows up.

00:16:50.760 It never flows down.

00:16:52.120 So it's all about making those Benjamins with these guys.

00:16:55.620 And, and the reason there is that accountability, if the, if you're going down to Florida, like

00:17:00.440 I did many times, cause I was working other cases, I would come back with a little taste

00:17:05.760 by that.

00:17:06.640 I mean, an envelope with a couple of thousands in it.

00:17:08.840 Maybe I come back with some of the stolen merchandise that we claim that we have when in

00:17:13.740 reality were forfeited jewelry.

00:17:15.900 And I would say here, you earn a little.

00:17:18.000 So I, it's all about the mob of making money.

00:17:22.100 It isn't about your personality and as jovial as you think you may are, or great storyteller

00:17:27.640 or this and that.

00:17:28.420 If you're not making money for the mob, you're not even going to be anywhere near it because

00:17:32.960 it's all about them sucking the life form out of you.

00:17:36.500 Now, when you were there in 2000, who was the boss in 2000?

00:17:39.460 Well, when I got there, the boss was unknown.

00:17:44.200 We found that the acting boss was Arnold Scutieri, who was a loyalist to John Gotti, John Gotti

00:17:50.280 jr.

00:17:50.960 And was part of the triumvirate that they had of that family.

00:17:56.120 But then Arnold Scutieri took the nod of being the acting boss.

00:18:00.560 And then came the underboss, which was Anthony Magali.

00:18:04.560 And then the, uh, Concierri was, uh, Jojo Carrazzo.

00:18:09.160 Those were the three that we didn't know as to who was running it because originally they

00:18:15.280 said it was John Gotti jr.

00:18:17.080 Then Peter Gotti.

00:18:18.540 And then when Arnold took over as the acting boss, he ran that organization.

00:18:24.580 Got it.

00:18:24.980 Got it.

00:18:25.460 And so, uh, so 2002, 2004, you're spending all this time with, uh, De Palma.

00:18:32.980 Are you driving him around?

00:18:34.680 Is he the one that you're driving around?

00:18:36.440 Yes.

00:18:36.880 I want, how it worked is his son who tried to commit suicide at the prison.

00:18:43.020 This cause he too was arrested in the scores case.

00:18:46.060 Okay.

00:18:46.540 And also the one down in Atlanta, Georgia, I think it was called solid goal.

00:18:50.700 Some big strip club down there where all the celebrity stars and, uh,

00:18:55.460 and athletes would go.

00:18:56.600 He got arrested with Greg.

00:18:59.220 There was rumors that Craig was cooperating and Greg arranged it, that he would meet with

00:19:06.640 his son, Craig, and pretty much challenged him and said, you're a disgrace, not only to

00:19:11.820 the family name, you're a disgrace to Cosa Nostra.

00:19:15.000 So what happened was they found him in his, um, cell hung.

00:19:21.460 So Greg De Palma, when he came out of prison, he requested a, one of those, uh, uh, release,

00:19:28.660 compassionate release.

00:19:30.140 And Craig De Palma was released and put in a nursing home in Westchester.

00:19:35.740 Now the irony of that is Greg De Palma went to all these nursing homes and found one.

00:19:43.020 And he specifically told the, uh, the director of the nursing home that there was not going

00:19:48.040 to be any mob stuff.

00:19:49.260 And the reason why everybody knew Greg De Palma was a gangster because of his Westchester premiere

00:19:55.320 theater days.

00:19:56.300 So what happens within a week, we had all our meetings at the nursing home.

00:20:01.680 All the wise guys will come in there.

00:20:03.920 And my heart ached when you see the family members looking at their elderly, uh, uh, family

00:20:10.840 members and surrounded by all these gangsters who were either taking action or, or paying

00:20:17.040 tribute payment to the mob.

00:20:18.740 So Greg De Palma wound up running his whole operation.

00:20:22.920 He was what I thought a good father, or was he a good gangster because he was loving his

00:20:30.680 son and taking care of him.

00:20:32.460 But, you know, it was a little weird because it was also kind of selfish on Greg because

00:20:38.740 it was known out there that Greg's son cooperated and that was a reflection on him.

00:20:44.960 So, but of course, Greg De Palma's story was not that he was cooperating, but instead

00:20:50.720 it was the marshals who killed him.

00:20:53.700 I mean, as outrageous that was, that's what he, uh, he was putting out there in order to

00:20:58.960 cover himself in, uh, in the Gambino crime family.

00:21:02.140 Was he a, was he a, like a real, real mafioso where his loyalty was to La Cosa Nostra over

00:21:08.620 family, where he followed the code to the T?

00:21:11.500 Was he known as somebody like that?

00:21:13.580 Greg De Palma was brilliant in this regard.

00:21:16.980 Yes.

00:21:17.200 He had a big mouth, but again, like I said earlier, that was great for the FBI.

00:21:22.020 He loved to talk.

00:21:22.800 We love to listen, but the interesting thing about Greg, and he told me this in confidence,

00:21:27.540 when you make money in the mob, you have to kick up, you kick up to your soldier.

00:21:32.880 If you're reporting to a soldier, you kick up to your skipper and then the skipper kicks

00:21:37.580 up to the administration.

00:21:38.700 Okay.

00:21:39.600 What Greg De Palma told me is he gave more than the normal amount because he always felt

00:21:45.700 that the more you give will keep him in social graces with the administration in case he screwed

00:21:51.360 up.

00:21:51.820 And Greg De Palma was known for that.

00:21:54.840 So he did play the Cosa Nostra rules where he gave money to his bosses in excess just in

00:22:01.740 case he messed up.

00:22:02.840 They were going to leave him alone out of it, or maybe just, you know, uh, let him walk.

00:22:08.700 Interesting.

00:22:09.440 So he had the wisdom there to know that, uh, let me make sure the people above me are

00:22:14.580 happy.

00:22:14.900 So one, they're not paranoid.

00:22:16.000 And two, I keep getting the favors and the benefit.

00:22:19.100 Uh, was he a decent earner himself or was he more of a enforcer?

00:22:22.800 No, he was a very good earner.

00:22:24.880 He had a lot of construction companies up in Westchester that were on record with him.

00:22:29.840 He had control of a lot of union.

00:22:32.160 Uh, Greg De Palma was, uh, like I said, he was a celebrity and it was kind of weird too,

00:22:37.520 Patrick, because when we would go out to dinner and we would go to these fancy restaurants

00:22:41.780 in Westchester, honest people, you could tell there was successful businessman older would

00:22:47.340 come to our table just to shake hands with Greg De Palma and reminisce about the great

00:22:52.880 times that they had a Westchester premiere theater.

00:22:55.560 And Greg De Palma would take their calling card, their business card, and you could see him

00:23:00.920 looking at that and saying, how do I get in this guy's pocket?

00:23:05.280 How do I, what can I get out of this guy in the future?

00:23:08.480 By the end of the day, sometimes you have 20, uh, business cards and he was always thinking

00:23:13.840 he was a true Cosa Nostra of always thinking of where to make money, how to rob money in

00:23:19.600 every regard is, is that, is that his DNA or is that the DNA, the Cosa Cosa Nostra, where

00:23:25.720 they're always looking at, how can I get more money of this guy in front of me?

00:23:28.580 Yes, absolutely.

00:23:29.360 That is the DNA with that.

00:23:30.980 It's all about making money, you know, and it's kind of funny when, when you hear them

00:23:36.160 and you see them constantly, it's always looking for angles.

00:23:40.180 It's always looking of how did I get over and it's how do I put the, and the way they

00:23:45.080 work is quite genius is they put you on record.

00:23:48.080 They think that you or your business establishment is going to be benefit from it and that no

00:23:53.960 one will mess with it.

00:23:55.060 Well, along with that comes, you got to pay.

00:23:58.240 And along with that comes that now you own a restaurant.

00:24:01.220 Okay.

00:24:01.720 So where are you getting your produce?

00:24:03.840 Where are you getting your wines?

00:24:05.380 Where are you getting your linen?

00:24:06.720 Who's doing your garbage?

00:24:08.140 They got the guys.

00:24:09.640 So they'll put these people in place and every place that they put in people, they put in

00:24:15.060 put in, of course they're kicking back to the mob.

00:24:18.220 So it's just the way they work.

00:24:20.520 It's a constant money-making organization of every way that they can, because that's what

00:24:26.820 it's all about with them.

00:24:27.860 It's all about the greed.

00:24:28.960 And that's all I think I was able to get into them because of the greed is you wave a little

00:24:34.660 money, you make yourself to be the goose that laid the golden egg.

00:24:37.800 And there you go.

00:24:38.960 You have it.

00:24:40.160 Now, a question for you about that, when you're talking about, you know, hey, you give

00:24:45.340 me some money, I'm going to protect you.

00:24:47.140 The mob of the 80s is very different than the mob of the 2000s because Pistone came and

00:24:50.740 cleaned house himself from 76 to 81.

00:24:53.000 I believe he was there for like five years and 10 months, whatever Pistone's timeline

00:24:56.200 was as an undercover agent.

00:24:58.300 So the days of, if somebody messes with you, we're going to take them out.

00:25:02.520 You can't necessarily do that in the 2000s, 2002.

00:25:05.260 So what is the business model if no one fears you?

00:25:08.800 What do people fear that you're going to do to them if you're not going to take their

00:25:11.700 lives?

00:25:12.680 Well, the mob has definitely morphed itself from way back in the old days.

00:25:17.160 They come to realize that leaving bodies on the street is bad for business.

00:25:21.540 OK, so they know that.

00:25:23.260 So yes, they are careful.

00:25:25.740 They like to operate more in the gray area like strip clubs or those corrupt union officials

00:25:31.420 that they go in.

00:25:32.160 They're not as open shotgun plan like they were in the old days to try to shake down

00:25:36.660 everybody and everything because they know that people are wise to them.

00:25:41.040 So it's kind of a catch 22 for them.

00:25:43.980 They know that the mob runs on fear.

00:25:46.520 But if they can't beat you up and they can't kill you, how is that fear going to be generated?

00:25:53.540 Exactly.

00:25:53.720 So it does revert to sometimes to old fashioned beatings, you know, where they just come,

00:25:58.900 they'll beat you up, tune you up and tell you they're coming back.

00:26:01.260 But then they're also very careful that you're going to call the cops and put them in jail.

00:26:06.860 So it's a delicate dance that the mob does now and takes that extra precaution of really

00:26:14.560 doing background on an individual company or person to see if they're the kind of people

00:26:20.620 that you could approach.

00:26:22.240 Because one false move lands you in jail for extortion.

00:26:25.360 Yeah, but I'm trying to see again, that business model in 2002 with the technology and where

00:26:32.120 we're at beating people up, you come beat the person up, that person calls the cops the

00:26:37.860 next time you're coming to collect taxes or whatever you're going to be collecting, they

00:26:41.460 record, they turn it in, you're fake.

00:26:44.200 You even the beating up stuff.

00:26:46.460 I mean, yeah, I'll take a beating one time, two times.

00:26:48.900 The person who calls them up, you know, it's so so it's a dramatic shift in business model

00:26:55.100 for it not to be that effective.

00:26:57.380 So so let me ask you, I asked you a question about De Palma being a earner.

00:27:01.160 You said he's an earner.

00:27:02.460 Was he also a capable guy?

00:27:03.960 Was he also a guy that was capable of, you know, crossing the line and, you know, handling

00:27:09.740 the highest level of job if needed?

00:27:11.300 Well, the way it was explained to me when I was proposed by Greg De Palma, how it works

00:27:17.580 is they really the mob looks for earners.

00:27:19.780 Guys are going to make money.

00:27:21.680 Now, if you are a person who plays by the rules, keeps their mouth shut, is capable of

00:27:27.820 violence, could do time.

00:27:30.120 OK, you get proposed to be put into this life, but not everybody is a killer.

00:27:35.920 They have their own shooters.

00:27:37.280 How they work is you could be called upon to do something, whether it's dig a grave, drive

00:27:43.560 a getaway car to a block car with the police sometime and someplace they may call you.

00:27:50.720 But unlike what the glamorization of Hollywood, not everybody's a killer.

00:27:55.800 Not everybody had to kill somebody to get straightened out.

00:27:58.960 OK, there are a lot of guys who don't because these guys were making big time money, which

00:28:03.200 what the mob is about.

00:28:04.540 Yes, they do have their shooters, but not that.

00:28:07.280 So keeping as far as Greg is concerned, he never opened up to me about any murders, simply

00:28:13.280 because in his teaching of me of mob ways, he says once that bullet leaves the gun, you

00:28:19.220 never talk about it.

00:28:21.140 So it's like, why would he talk about that unless he's that dumb to say if he was involved?

00:28:26.620 But what we do know about Greg De Palma, he was a Nino Gadge's crew.

00:28:31.420 It was the same crew of Roy DeMille.

00:28:33.200 Now, so, yes, could he have been involved in something?

00:28:37.200 You know, Roy DeMille was just a sadistic killer.

00:28:40.200 So who knows what he did?

00:28:42.420 But as far as with me, he never led me on to believe that he was involved, nor did he

00:28:47.840 brag that he was involved in any killings.

00:28:49.840 Yeah, the only reason I'm asking is because when I was sitting down with Sammy, you know,

00:28:56.100 an interview with John A. Light, John A. Light said, ask anybody.

00:28:59.840 I've never seen John Gotti Sr. kill anybody.

00:29:02.800 John always had people like me kill people, right?

00:29:05.040 Now, that's John A. Light saying.

00:29:06.780 Then I went and brought that up to Sammy.

00:29:08.940 Sammy said, let me put it to you this way.

00:29:11.720 Gotti, if he had to, I don't know if he did or not, because, you know, Sammy's such a true

00:29:15.400 mafioso, he's not going to, even if he knows the answer, he wouldn't say it because it's

00:29:19.680 not his style to do that because he still fully respects the code, what it was obviously

00:29:25.100 minus what happened years ago.

00:29:27.420 He said, don't get it twisted.

00:29:29.300 John Gotti is very, very capable because if he needed to do something, he would do it.

00:29:34.360 He's not somebody that you want to think that he wouldn't do it.

00:29:36.800 And then you hear John Gotti Jr.

00:29:39.500 when they ask him about Sammy, even though there's obviously a big follow-up between those

00:29:43.220 families years ago, even John Gotti said, Sammy, if there's one thing about Sammy, you

00:29:47.540 have to respect.

00:29:48.160 He's a true mafioso.

00:29:49.860 Everyone knew he was capable.

00:29:51.540 So that's what I'm asking is, was De Palma somebody that was a capable person that he

00:29:55.060 could have done something, you know, or was he just a guy that was making money?

00:29:58.700 From what I know, he was a moneymaker.

00:30:00.740 Okay.

00:30:01.020 You know, he was strictly a moneymaker.

00:30:02.640 He had the Westchester premiere theater, but he also had access to shooters, just like what

00:30:08.660 you mentioned.

00:30:09.120 Why get your hands dirty when you can get somebody to do that for you?

00:30:13.220 Makes sense.

00:30:14.000 Makes sense with that part.

00:30:16.460 By the way, do you notice a commonality amongst those who are earners that had a very, very

00:30:21.760 high level of charm, charisma, persuasion, sales, negotiation, and at the same time, the

00:30:29.300 model was have people around you that everyone feared, but you stayed the good guy.

00:30:33.780 So it was trying to stay the good guy, you know, versus you had the bad cops around, you

00:30:38.180 know, the whole good cop, bad cop.

00:30:39.480 Obviously, this is a, they're definitely far from being cops, but did you notice the main

00:30:44.700 earners were always protected and the best of the best at charming, charismatic, and

00:30:50.160 attractive and persuaders?

00:30:52.360 Absolutely.

00:30:53.180 Spot on with that.

00:30:54.340 These guys were more polished.

00:30:56.320 Like in the mob, there's your gangsters and there are your racketeers.

00:31:00.940 Racketeer is a polished guy.

00:31:02.560 If you are an individual who makes a lot of money, you do surround, look, you're only allowed

00:31:08.720 to exist because they let you exist and they guard you to exist.

00:31:14.480 So obviously you're going to have the muscle around you and you could also call on that

00:31:19.980 muscle because if you're working with the mob, by all means, that they're going to say

00:31:25.300 there's a problem.

00:31:26.360 He's not going to get his hands dirty.

00:31:28.440 He'll go see a skipper or his soldier and say, look, we got an issue here.

00:31:32.840 They'll handle that for him.

00:31:34.740 You know, you notice a trend with that.

00:31:36.160 But, you know, I sat down with Leonetti and Leonetti would tell me stories about Scarfo,

00:31:41.900 you know, his uncle and how Scarfo was.

00:31:44.200 And then I sit down with Ralph Natale and Ralph Natale will tell stories, different stories

00:31:49.720 of Scarfo, right?

00:31:50.980 And what he was saying, Ralph Natale is definitely not a fan of Phil Leonetti and Phil Leonetti

00:31:55.820 is just, he wants to have nothing to do with the mob.

00:31:58.020 He wants to just live the life that he lives and he wants to have nothing to do with Merlino

00:32:02.160 and none of those guys, et cetera, et cetera.

00:32:03.840 Great.

00:32:04.120 But they watched and they heard stories being told of the people prior to them, right?

00:32:11.500 When Leonetti's around Scarfo, Scarfo would tell stories.

00:32:15.400 Let me tell you how this was.

00:32:16.540 And let me tell you how this wasn't.

00:32:18.000 Even one time they went and met Meyer Lansky and there was a certain connection there with

00:32:22.160 Lansky.

00:32:22.760 And Natale has a lot of stories of Skinny Razor and all these other stories that come up

00:32:27.540 and you keep hearing about these guys, right?

00:32:29.280 What stories of which personalities did, you know, De Palma tell you stories of?

00:32:37.280 People in the past.

00:32:38.140 I'm sure he had stories about Gotti.

00:32:40.460 I'm sure he had stories about different people.

00:32:42.000 But what were some of the stories that stuck with you from the people in La Cosa Nostra?

00:32:46.260 I'm not talking about Sinatra stories, Dean Martin stories.

00:32:48.740 We can get into that here in a minute.

00:32:50.060 I'm talking specifically from the mob life.

00:32:51.880 Yeah, one thing about Greg, he was very close to Paul Castellano.

00:32:57.420 Paul Castellano put him in, actually proposed him for a membership.

00:33:03.040 So he had this closeness to, he was also enamored with John Gotti.

00:33:08.200 Actually told me that when John Gotti was in prison, he took care of John Gotti.

00:33:12.880 He said he bought him a hat because he sometimes was called chief.

00:33:17.160 And it was a white hat with the word chief on it.

00:33:19.940 He said that he would take care of him, feed him during the final days.

00:33:24.640 And everybody knew that, that that's what Greg.

00:33:27.400 So he had this fondness.

00:33:29.460 Greg was kind of like a brown noser.

00:33:32.760 You know, when it came to power, he wanted to surround himself with the power in order

00:33:37.980 to be protected by this power.

00:33:40.340 Now, Grant, you look at Sammy, I'm sorry, you look at Paul Castellano, you look at him.

00:33:46.140 I know he was very close with a lot of the old timers.

00:33:49.000 One guy in particular was Rudy Santabello.

00:33:51.920 Rudy Santabello killed the police officer, actually did time and beat it through the

00:33:56.520 Supreme Court.

00:33:57.800 And then he came out and we used to go to his social club and meet with Rudy, who was

00:34:02.540 this little tiny person.

00:34:03.940 They used to call him Handsome Rudy, but a very powerful guy who was a captain in the

00:34:09.380 West Side and the Genovese family.

00:34:11.820 So Greg's circle was more of the old timers.

00:34:15.180 And none of these guys sat around and bragged like, I whacked this guy, I killed this guy.

00:34:20.900 They subscribed to that, never talk about it, whether they did or don't.

00:34:24.860 But we all assume that they had the power to do that because that is what Cozenostra is

00:34:31.160 all about, that maybe they don't get their hands dirty, but somebody else will.

00:34:35.600 But he talked about John Gotti Jr.

00:34:38.140 He talked very much about how John was great.

00:34:42.720 He mourned every year at the day that John passed away.

00:34:48.660 He always felt devastated that John, he was looking forward for Jr. to come out, as were

00:34:56.480 we.

00:34:57.400 But the problem is Jr. got hit with the Curtis Lewa charges and they kept him in jail.

00:35:03.180 So Greg actually made a phone call with an FBI phone that he contacted the family of

00:35:11.060 John Gotti Jr.

00:35:12.020 saying, hey, you know, when is he getting out and all of that?

00:35:15.360 And they said they had some problems with him.

00:35:17.720 So there was always this thing with Greg and others that it was always trying to get to

00:35:24.980 the top and do whatever it was necessary.

00:35:27.360 In fact, when I was out there with him and we charged Arnold Scutieri, the acting boss and

00:35:33.000 Megali, he had Arnold Scutieri and Alphonse Siska called Funzi, who was also a captain in the

00:35:41.680 Gambinos.

00:35:42.460 They shook down this very well to do a guy and they took his American Express black, not

00:35:49.880 platinum, but black card.

00:35:51.720 And there they went on a spending spree with their wives to Vegas.

00:35:56.420 And then after like 20,000 being spent, they cut the card off and we have it on tape because

00:36:04.360 I was wearing the recorder.

00:36:05.640 When they're calling in, they're saying, you tell this guy to reactivate his card.

00:36:10.720 That's an embarrassment to me that this card was cut off.

00:36:14.560 And these guys were like kids in the candy stores.

00:36:17.640 Their wives were doing mani pedis, hairdo.

00:36:20.040 They were shopping in the malls of the of the casinos.

00:36:24.060 It's it was just insane of the abuse that they did.

00:36:28.200 But again, there goes Greg kissing up to the bosses so he would be OK with them as opposed

00:36:36.060 to a guy who sits quiet.

00:36:37.660 And then when it comes to take somebody out to say, well, what good is this guy?

00:36:41.240 He doesn't put any money in my pocket.

00:36:43.320 I mean, I remember I sold I we came up with a scheme of giving plasma TVs and this actually

00:36:51.540 happened, which I think you'll find that amazing.

00:36:53.280 So instead of buying it, a plasma TV, I told him I fell off the back of the truck and my

00:37:00.120 guys got it.

00:37:00.980 So we give it to Arnold Scuteri.

00:37:03.300 Now, Arnold Scuteri's home watching The Sopranos.

00:37:07.060 Now, do you remember the scene where Robert Leogia with Feech LaManna comes out of prison

00:37:14.120 and things have changed and he's a little threatening to Tony Soprano because he was

00:37:18.620 old school.

00:37:19.460 He didn't like the way things were work.

00:37:21.080 Yeah.

00:37:21.280 So they set him up by putting and storing these plasma TVs in the garage and then drop

00:37:26.920 a dime to the probation officer.

00:37:29.300 And boom, he gets arrested again.

00:37:32.760 Feech LaManna.

00:37:33.320 Well, what happened is Greg DePalma calls me in the morning.

00:37:37.580 He says, I got to see you.

00:37:39.340 I says, you're not going to believe what happened yesterday.

00:37:41.540 I know it's true, but I got to ask you anyway.

00:37:43.880 Is that television stolen?

00:37:45.960 I go, what do you think, Greg?

00:37:47.520 Well, I think I went to the store.

00:37:48.820 Of course, the store.

00:37:49.440 He goes, I knew it.

00:37:50.440 Last night, I get a call from the boss.

00:37:52.900 He's watching that damn Soprano show and they talking about these plasma TVs because he

00:37:58.640 too was on parole.

00:37:59.640 And he says, get this thing out of my house and get it out of there now.

00:38:04.160 They yanked the TV out of the wall just for fear.

00:38:08.380 So you talk about life imitating art.

00:38:10.840 That was it.

00:38:12.280 That was a perfect example.

00:38:14.580 So, you know, so this is again, Greg immediately volunteers.

00:38:18.380 When I told him I had a couple that fell off the back of the truck, let's give it to the

00:38:21.880 boss.

00:38:22.960 You know, that's the way he always buttered up everybody.

00:38:25.940 And he was a master at, I mean, he would see you, Patrick, and he'd be thinking, how

00:38:31.360 do I get in your pocket?

00:38:32.520 How do I get in your business?

00:38:34.240 You know, and then he'll say, okay, he's looking for ways to exploit you.

00:38:37.940 That's what he does with everybody.

00:38:39.460 Cause that's the nature of the beast with these guys.

00:38:42.520 That's natural, dude.

00:38:43.540 That's not just a gift.

00:38:45.760 How do they get, is there a training for that or no, you just see somebody do it and

00:38:50.280 you learn it and you pick it up.

00:38:51.440 Meaning is, is more caught or taught?

00:38:54.680 You know, it's something I think growing up in these neighborhoods, these guys are not

00:38:59.980 boy scouts, as you know, they're out there committing crimes as kids.

00:39:03.800 Then they wound up going to jail or jail.

00:39:06.340 It's like going to Oxford to these guys, just sitting around prison.

00:39:09.780 They're talking about scams here, scams that they got in the future.

00:39:13.800 There's always a way to make it money, but it's in their DNA.

00:39:17.400 I've gone out with Greg DePalma to the big man shop that they had in New York city called,

00:39:22.640 uh, uh, anyway, it skips me.

00:39:25.500 It is beautiful store they had on fifth Avenue, right?

00:39:28.100 We walk in, I'm looking at clothes, right?

00:39:30.640 Here's Greg DePalma sticking ties, socks down his pants.

00:39:34.560 I go, what are you doing?

00:39:35.920 So he goes, what do you mean what I'm doing?

00:39:37.800 I said, we're going to take a pinch over here.

00:39:39.320 You're, you're robbing.

00:39:40.320 I'll buy them for you.

00:39:41.440 Give them to me.

00:39:41.960 He goes, nah, forget that.

00:39:43.340 He goes, Jackie, this is what we do.

00:39:45.580 You know, this is who I am.

00:39:47.900 So it's their DNA.

00:39:50.000 They are thieves.

00:39:51.600 They are criminals and they could be putting on their fedoras.

00:39:55.540 They could be pious men with fedoras and 45s, but they're nothing but criminals.

00:40:00.940 That's all they are.

00:40:02.240 And they're looking to get in people's pocket and without any remorse.

00:40:06.340 You think that can ever change with them?

00:40:07.820 You think that part can ever change?

00:40:09.300 No, and I think, uh, I think I'm probably the only guy who feels that the mafia is going

00:40:14.000 to come back.

00:40:14.740 And I'll tell you why in the FBI, the investigative priorities of organized crime is it's so low.

00:40:22.260 I mean, right now we have terrorism, uh, cyber, uh, foreign counterintelligence.

00:40:28.100 It's not even in the top 10 where, when I was working it, we were in the top 10.

00:40:33.020 Now what happened is they consolidated five squads into three squads.

00:40:38.500 And they got rid of a lot of guys on the task force.

00:40:41.660 So what do you think is going on?

00:40:43.520 If there's nobody there to pursue these guys, they're doing what they're supposed to.

00:40:48.540 We are.

00:40:48.740 They're a criminal secret society.

00:40:50.880 They've crawled back under the rocks and they're making their moves in a way, knowing

00:40:55.560 that they're not being looked at simply because we don't have the manpower to do it.

00:40:59.680 That's interesting for you to say that this, they could be coming back.

00:41:02.360 So, uh, because, you know, Merlino wasn't something recently with the election four weeks

00:41:07.160 ago that his name came up, uh, that he may have been involved in the scandal of elections.

00:41:11.440 And, you know, mob's been involved with elections for God knows how many years since Dewey days,

00:41:15.860 you know, you can go way, way back with elections, but, you know, so, so you're saying it's in

00:41:20.060 their DNA.

00:41:20.620 You don't think it can change.

00:41:21.620 So you don't think one of these things about, Hey, you know, I'm a changed man right now.

00:41:25.820 I don't have the same tendency as I'm trying to get money out of your pocket and I'm living

00:41:29.300 a straight life.

00:41:30.120 You think it's something that will never, ever go away once they're in it for 20, 30, 40 years.

00:41:34.640 Listen, first of all, I commend you for the hosts, the guests that you've had on your

00:41:40.200 shows.

00:41:40.740 I mean, you've had some serious heavyweight guys.

00:41:44.160 I mean, Sammy, the bull, I mean, come on, he is, he's a bad guy, period.

00:41:49.540 19 murders, you know, I mean, he's, uh, he's a tough guy on the street, you know, uh, you've

00:41:56.560 had Phil Leonetti, another one.

00:41:58.900 It's, I mean, these are serious guys now have they changed or are they capable of changing?

00:42:03.880 I don't know.

00:42:05.380 It's if you, you know, what's the old saying?

00:42:07.460 You can't change the spot of a leopard.

00:42:09.520 Are you going to change this?

00:42:11.420 I mean, Sammy had his shot to be changed and then he went into ecstasy and he got collared.

00:42:16.800 So I don't know.

00:42:18.000 I hope that they see their light to see whether it's possible, but would you want to be their

00:42:23.980 next door neighbor?

00:42:25.580 I know I would.

00:42:27.600 So the answer is you don't think.

00:42:29.280 Okay.

00:42:29.760 So, so let me, let me go back to a part where we're talking about.

00:42:32.380 We spent a lot of time with De Palma and he was famous for talking a lot.

00:42:34.960 Was there anybody that he had a dislike, a extreme dislike for from the past in the mob

00:42:41.120 world?

00:42:42.100 Yes.

00:42:42.340 There were two people yet.

00:42:43.860 One was Nicky Carrazzo.

00:42:46.000 Okay.

00:42:46.200 Okay.

00:42:46.500 He used to call him the midget.

00:42:48.060 That was his name.

00:42:48.740 He's the former boss, little Nicky.

00:42:49.740 Little Nicky, but he called him the midget.

00:42:51.820 Okay.

00:42:51.960 And then the other one was a guy that he actually proposed for membership.

00:42:55.240 Besides proposing me, he also promoted Nicky LaSorza.

00:42:59.040 Now, Nicky LaSorza is a very wealthy guy.

00:43:01.860 His family owns the LaSorza Chevrolet in the Bronx, huge, huge place.

00:43:06.120 And Nicky made a lot of money.

00:43:08.000 So when Greg De Palma went to jail, he told Nicky, I want you to go pick up money at these

00:43:14.800 places that he has on record with him and send it to my wife.

00:43:19.500 Well, Nicky was too busy.

00:43:20.820 He had money.

00:43:21.540 He was going to that famous restaurant in Greenwich, Connecticut, where all the celebrities

00:43:27.540 would go.

00:43:28.540 And he's partying up a storm.

00:43:30.820 Greg De Palma, I'll show you how insane the mentality is.

00:43:33.960 He gets approached while in jail with a drug dealer in a wheelchair.

00:43:38.940 It was this guy, a Spanish drug dealer from the Heights.

00:43:41.940 And he says to him, listen, if you want me to take care of this guy, I got a guy that

00:43:46.800 could whack this Nicky LaSorza because he was mother effing this guy up and down in prison.

00:43:51.440 Right.

00:43:52.280 So what does he do?

00:43:53.420 They set up a guy to come in who was an undercover ATF agent to meet with Greg De Palma.

00:44:00.220 And Greg De Palma spills out what he wants this guy to be killed.

00:44:04.740 OK.

00:44:04.960 Now, what happens is Greg De Palma gets charged.

00:44:08.680 And like a good criminal that he is in organized crime is where they never admit that they're

00:44:14.760 guilty.

00:44:15.800 It's always like John Gotti said, you could catch me with a steeple coming out of my ass.

00:44:20.180 I did not rob it.

00:44:22.060 Well, the same was Greg De Palma.

00:44:23.740 The only time he took a plea was when he was in the Scores case and John Gotti told him

00:44:29.960 to take a plea.

00:44:31.340 So he took it because that's the boss.

00:44:33.820 Now, what happens is Greg is found not guilty, even though overwhelming takes and evidence,

00:44:41.340 you know.

00:44:41.620 So Greg De Palma comes out of prison and he's trying to reclaim his places, including the

00:44:48.500 strip club that we were at now that I had infiltrated.

00:44:52.000 OK.

00:44:52.260 So now what happens is the FBI is saying, listen, this guy is marked for death.

00:44:58.280 He tried to whack somebody.

00:45:01.700 In fact, the FBI went to see Greg De Palma and says, Greg, you're out of jail.

00:45:06.760 We know, have information that you're marked for death.

00:45:09.700 And Greg De Palma says, I don't know what you're talking about.

00:45:12.520 Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

00:45:14.840 Right.

00:45:15.060 And then we're saying, OK, so I'm out to lunch with this guy at meetings and I'm making

00:45:21.040 sure that my back is facing the wall and I'm watching the door because this thing could

00:45:25.860 break any time.

00:45:26.820 I mean, you know, you start to think maybe someone's going to go down.

00:45:30.240 Well, typical Greg, our surveillance starts picking up Greg and they see Greg De Palma going

00:45:35.900 to see the bosses, going to see this guy.

00:45:38.640 He's spending time.

00:45:40.080 He's networking like you wouldn't believe.

00:45:42.260 About two weeks later, the guy who we paid the money to keep the Albanian says, listen,

00:45:47.920 this place is back with Greg or you guys could come with me.

00:45:54.220 We chose Greg.

00:45:56.260 And the reason why we chose Greg is because he talks so much.

00:46:00.580 You know, we're not going to hitch a wagon to a guy named Louis Filipelli, who is now

00:46:04.720 a captain.

00:46:05.400 That was his name.

00:46:06.580 Why should I put my horse to him?

00:46:08.900 What are we going to get?

00:46:09.640 Maybe little sponges here and there?

00:46:11.140 Or am I going to hit the mother low with Greg?

00:46:14.080 And that's what we did.

00:46:15.060 But you had I was careful because all throughout the case, they were saying the boss was saying,

00:46:21.520 you need to sit down with Nicholas Sorcerer and kiss and make up.

00:46:25.280 And we finally had that sit down where they shook hands and they did it for the better

00:46:30.480 cause.

00:46:31.200 But if I was Nicholas, because I would have been pissed that this guy tried to kill me,

00:46:36.100 which he did.

00:46:36.680 He actually set the contract out.

00:46:38.520 Interesting.

00:46:38.840 Very interesting when you when you're talking about who he didn't like and why he didn't

00:46:43.400 like, you know, even the bosses sometimes you hear about.

00:46:46.740 Did he ever have any opinions about the relationship between Sammy and Gotti or he never talked

00:46:51.680 about Sammy and Gotti?

00:46:53.300 No, he never talked about Sammy.

00:46:54.920 But he like I said, he did love John Gotti.

00:46:57.620 He respected him.

00:46:59.300 Sammy, no.

00:47:00.200 But Sammy's reputation was always, you know, he's a tough guy, Sammy.

00:47:04.900 I mean, I was glad, by the way, that was an excellent interview with him.

00:47:08.800 And I thought that Sammy is the real thing.

00:47:11.800 And now I hear he's got his own show.

00:47:14.200 So that's kind of interesting.

00:47:17.360 But, you know, Sammy is a guy out there who you don't want to mess around with, you know.

00:47:23.120 And now would he go full gangster on you?

00:47:26.240 I don't know.

00:47:26.840 But I certainly would want to find out, you know, if I'm a civilian out there, certainly

00:47:31.820 approaching.

00:47:32.600 And that's one of the interesting thing.

00:47:34.040 You got a guy like that who serves minimal time in prison and he's out.

00:47:37.620 He could be a next door neighbor.

00:47:39.100 He could be having, you know, you don't know who he is.

00:47:41.900 And boom.

00:47:42.560 Now, I do have a chance.

00:47:43.980 I've spoken to a lot of guys in the life who cooperated and are now in the witness protection

00:47:51.460 program or left the witness protection program because they just couldn't handle the restrictions

00:47:56.880 and the parameters.

00:47:58.500 And some of them are really, they realize that they, and they all say, those who are not

00:48:03.920 happy, that they were betrayed by Cosa Nostra.

00:48:08.260 They betrayed them.

00:48:09.780 And they, of course, they mentioned the reasons for that.

00:48:13.680 And they feel, and these are guys whose family were part of organized crime.

00:48:19.120 They grew up in that life, but they felt like they were betrayed.

00:48:23.340 And their stories are, you know, you believe that.

00:48:26.860 And maybe Sammy, his story, the way he was betrayed by John, whether that's truth or not.

00:48:32.360 But if obviously, if it's true, then of course you have to, you know, decide why he broke that

00:48:39.140 or Murtaugh code because he broke it because it was all garbage.

00:48:43.700 If you're going to lie to me and you're going to put me in harm's way for nothing to do and

00:48:48.200 just so you can get out, you know, everything's off the table then.

00:48:53.040 So you see it from Sammy's point of view just as much as anybody else's, anybody from Gotti's

00:48:57.540 point of view.

00:48:58.520 You mean as far as seeing it from Sammy?

00:49:00.740 I think what Sammy did is, it's not being a rat.

00:49:04.360 I think what Sammy did was he saved his life.

00:49:07.800 He said, hey, you know what?

00:49:08.840 I did so much for you.

00:49:10.660 I'm not doing it again.

00:49:11.800 Now, of course, that's a delicate subject with Gotti's and Sammy the Bull, but Sammy did

00:49:18.160 make a lot of good cases for us in the Bureau and provided a tremendous amount of intelligence.

00:49:23.840 Now, what do you think about when you think about the name Joe Pistone?

00:49:26.220 What comes to mind when you think about Joe Pistone?

00:49:28.740 Well, Joe was, I remember I got in the Bureau in 80 and in 81, I met Joe and I actually have

00:49:37.040 an autographed book of his, Joe is like one of the many pioneers of undercover.

00:49:42.860 There was a handful of guys, guys like Willie Reagan, Paul Branagh, Eddie Robb, et cetera.

00:49:48.540 Joe is one of them.

00:49:50.080 And keep in mind, people don't understand this, but undercover work is an investigative scenario,

00:49:57.020 just like it is in surveillance or wiretaps.

00:49:59.720 That's all it is.

00:50:01.040 And sometimes you're lucky.

00:50:02.580 Sometimes you're successful.

00:50:03.920 Other times you're not.

00:50:04.840 Other times your original plan snowballs into a bigger plan.

00:50:09.300 Joe being one of the, I guess, for lack of a better word, pioneers of this, he was at

00:50:17.460 a time when, and I saw this change in the Bureau.

00:50:20.760 When I first started doing undercover, there was nobody watching you 24 seven.

00:50:25.380 You were kind of on your own.

00:50:26.440 You did what you had to do.

00:50:27.520 And then you came back, you called the case agent and you've met him and you talked to

00:50:31.420 him, you told him what went on.

00:50:32.480 But now that's changed to, you know, you got full coverage on you.

00:50:37.160 Joe, what he did, I thought he did an excellent job with it.

00:50:41.440 In that, again, he's one of the pioneers, him and Eddie Robb was another guy that they

00:50:46.220 worked together in some case.

00:50:47.760 And they set the groundwork for us to do these cases, you know?

00:50:52.780 So I got a question for you.

00:50:54.360 I asked him, I'm curious to know what you're going to say about this.

00:50:56.760 I asked Joe, when we did the interview, I said, Joe, you know, I've interviewed other

00:51:03.600 mobsters and you sound more like you're a mobster than mobsters sound like they're a

00:51:11.420 mobster.

00:51:12.240 You dress like one, you put the glasses, you're quiet.

00:51:16.320 You don't say a lot.

00:51:17.260 You watch.

00:51:17.920 You're very calculating, et cetera, et cetera.

00:51:20.320 I said, I said, did it ever get to a point, because this is my assumption, and I said,

00:51:25.820 I want to hear your answer.

00:51:27.140 I said, did it ever get to a point where you enjoy the life so much that you wanted to drag

00:51:34.000 it out where the FBI finally said, you kind of crossed the line.

00:51:37.120 You could have saw this two, three years ago, but you've dragged this out for six years because

00:51:41.260 we're under the impression that you're actually enjoying the life.

00:51:44.800 And if you've seen the interview, you'll know what he said.

00:51:47.540 But I'm curious to know, what do you think?

00:51:49.260 Do you think you got to a point where maybe Joe was enjoying the life a little bit too

00:51:52.120 much and he didn't want to get away from it?

00:51:53.880 You know, I've never experienced that.

00:51:57.460 And I'll tell you why.

00:51:58.300 I've worked over 100 undercover cases, as well as countless by bus.

00:52:04.660 So my career is I jump from one case to the other.

00:52:07.700 So if you have a case and it's good and it's give you all the toys.

00:52:11.360 I mean, I played everything from big, I've driven Rolls Royces, 500E, Hummers H2s, Hummer

00:52:18.280 H1s.

00:52:19.420 I've driven all and I've had everything.

00:52:22.180 And for me, it was like, OK, you shut it down.

00:52:25.200 Hey, maybe you're short-sighted in shutting it down, but I'll move on to another case.

00:52:29.700 I think Joe is one of those guys who worked maybe a handful of cases.

00:52:33.860 So I don't know the background of why he wanted to keep it going.

00:52:39.820 But my thing has always been, and I've had fights, and in fact, if reading my book at

00:52:45.180 the end, I have fights with management because I've always was trained on the covers that

00:52:49.900 when you work a case, you walk up the ladder.

00:52:53.100 Everything has to go.

00:52:54.260 You try to get, as long as you're gathering evidence, as long as you're pursuing, as long

00:52:58.480 as there's nobody's life in danger or there are no threats, you keep marching until you

00:53:03.840 can't march anymore.

00:53:04.780 Unfortunately, in my case, after two and a half years, almost three, they pulled the

00:53:10.080 plug for no reason.

00:53:11.560 There was no, nobody didn't believe that I was anything but Jack Falcone.

00:53:15.740 My life was not in danger.

00:53:17.660 I wish I would have gotten the five or six years that Joe got, you know, so, but it wasn't.

00:53:23.520 It was curtailed for whatever reason.

00:53:25.980 Now, did that upset me and the United States attorneys that worked the case and the case

00:53:30.740 agents?

00:53:31.200 Absolutely.

00:53:31.640 But what can we do?

00:53:33.220 We're just points.

00:53:34.240 So I moved on to another case and did what I had to do.

00:53:37.220 In hindsight, yes, the case was successful.

00:53:39.860 We took down the administration of the postcardi, but, you know, I wish we could have had more

00:53:45.760 time.

00:53:46.380 I wanted to even go through the possibility of getting straightened out so I can introduce

00:53:51.380 other agents into the fold and maybe try to get that 32 into whatever to dismantle the

00:53:59.420 whole group.

00:54:00.220 So were you ever in it where Jack, were you ever in it where you're like, man, I'm, I

00:54:04.400 enjoy this life.

00:54:05.380 Was there anything about it that got you enamored where you were enjoying the life and you don't

00:54:08.980 want to leave it?

00:54:10.220 Well, you know, if you talk to people about I've enjoyed, you have to enjoy working undercover

00:54:15.360 no matter what you're doing.

00:54:17.140 I mean, I've enjoyed flying jet planes with drug dealers.

00:54:20.760 You know, I, I, all we enjoyed, I mean, the toys, the, the, the, the pink earring, the

00:54:26.520 Rolex president watch, the, the money I used to carry a knot like five G's in my pocket.

00:54:32.480 Now you ask me, lucky I got $10 on me, you know?

00:54:35.580 Yes.

00:54:35.860 I used to walk in a restaurant, waiters tripped themselves over to try to take care of big

00:54:40.100 Jackie boy.

00:54:40.760 You know how many do now I get sent to the bar and wait for my table.

00:54:44.380 You know, these are all changes that are adjusted.

00:54:47.360 Yes.

00:54:47.620 When you're out and undercover, you're acting, you take this persona because you, in order

00:54:53.160 to catch a criminal, you have to think and act like a criminal.

00:54:56.260 Yep.

00:54:56.400 So you have to play the roles, but you have to also understand that this is temporary.

00:55:02.700 I had clothes.

00:55:03.840 I had, um, Xenia suits that were bought with government funds that I had to return even

00:55:11.900 my underwear and socks.

00:55:13.680 Now who is going to buy a 66 long suit?

00:55:17.760 Yes.

00:55:18.320 Cause it's property.

00:55:20.400 So I've learned all my career.

00:55:22.860 I've learned through my career that, you know, Patrick, that enjoy it, go out there, enjoy

00:55:30.340 it.

00:55:30.840 Hey, listen, it's dangerous.

00:55:32.680 Keep your eyes.

00:55:33.480 We used to go to, when I was undercover, we go to these restaurants.

00:55:37.460 We take over these restaurants that were in contact.

00:55:40.060 We have five or six wise guys with about five strippers.

00:55:45.120 You know what I'm saying?

00:55:46.280 There was live champagne was flowing.

00:55:48.840 I mean, this is what these guys do.

00:55:51.080 You go out.

00:55:51.600 Sometimes I went for mani-pedis, never had a mani-pedi until I was with the mob.

00:55:56.940 You know, I had cucumbers, you know, I just think like Hillary would have known what a

00:56:02.840 cucumber was Hillary, right?

00:56:05.180 Baldwin.

00:56:05.940 But anyway, that's another story.

00:56:07.920 But yeah, it is seductive.

00:56:10.300 It's a seductive mistress.

00:56:11.660 It's something that takes you over and you got to be careful because it's going to end.

00:56:17.060 And if you think it's going to go on forever, it's not.

00:56:19.880 And if it starts affecting who you are, you better walk away.

00:56:25.000 Jack, the 26 you were in as an FBI, how many years of it were you married?

00:56:28.880 I got married in 84.

00:56:31.120 So I was, uh, listen, my wife, I think was a saint.

00:56:34.940 Let me tell you the success that I think I've had.

00:56:37.280 Okay.

00:56:38.100 It's because of her and my daughter.

00:56:40.900 Okay.

00:56:41.340 They grounded me.

00:56:42.400 I, even though I never saw them because I have my own apartment, very rarely do I saw

00:56:47.040 them.

00:56:47.300 It was like when I spoke to them and even if I missed the recital, even if I missed the

00:56:52.840 holiday, okay.

00:56:54.660 She didn't pressure me or get on me.

00:56:56.960 And that's important because you need to have a clear head when you're out there with the

00:57:01.800 bad guy.

00:57:02.340 You don't need to have, oh my God, my wife's mad at me.

00:57:05.260 She's going to leave.

00:57:06.140 She called me.

00:57:07.200 She was very good.

00:57:08.700 And I think because she lived in, with, in law enforcement prior to that with her parents,

00:57:15.060 then I think that's what made the edge.

00:57:17.080 But marriage, I've seen this job, Patrick, where it's affected people's marriage.

00:57:21.940 It's affected their drinking.

00:57:24.100 I've affected all kinds of guys have gone to the dark side.

00:57:27.940 Okay.

00:57:28.260 The only thing this job did to me is destroyed my weight, my weight.

00:57:32.860 I mean, I have issues because of that, because I'd learned how to eat, but Hey, that could

00:57:37.900 be worse.

00:57:38.420 You know what I'm saying?

00:57:39.220 I'm in it, but it does do something to you.

00:57:42.780 There's a lot of peril and not too many guys could sustain undercover.

00:57:46.520 So the guys who say, yeah, I worked undercover, what one, two years.

00:57:50.200 Yeah.

00:57:50.700 When you're out there 15 years, 20 years, you know, it's grinding.

00:57:55.300 It does things to you, you know?

00:57:57.600 So you're still married to the same wife from 1984.

00:58:00.600 That is correct.

00:58:02.900 Let me, I mean, she deserves a purple.

00:58:05.120 She deserves a medal, medal of honor type of deal.

00:58:08.520 She does.

00:58:08.860 And my daughter was born in the year 2000.

00:58:12.680 Keep in mind, cause I was never home.

00:58:14.240 So yes, if you do the math, she was 2000.

00:58:17.980 And then when I left the bureau in 2005, okay.

00:58:22.040 I went from driving Greg De Palma, a captain in the Gambino crime family to driving my five

00:58:28.760 year old daughter around.

00:58:30.180 And Patrick, let me tell you, there's no difference.

00:58:33.020 They both want things, buy me this, get me that, and get me this.

00:58:36.900 Non-stop.

00:58:38.860 Wow.

00:58:39.860 Wow.

00:58:40.540 You know, I, I hear these stories and I think with Stone as well, I think he's still married

00:58:45.800 to the same wife, by the way, you know, he is still married to the same wife.

00:58:49.320 So it's interesting.

00:58:50.920 Both of you guys haven't served as long as you did, and you're still married to the same

00:58:54.720 woman.

00:58:54.980 And you lived a very difficult life of a person to stay married to.

00:59:00.180 That is true.

00:59:01.020 And it was weird because when I would come home, those rare moments, did she know what

00:59:05.680 she did?

00:59:06.080 She knew what she did.

00:59:06.880 She knew I was in the FBI.

00:59:08.540 And of course, she didn't know you worked undercover.

00:59:10.240 No, no.

00:59:10.520 She didn't know.

00:59:11.080 She didn't know I was working undercover because I would come in to see her.

00:59:15.600 You know, how do you explain having an S 500 Mercedes?

00:59:19.000 And you know, when you're driving a regular car, so all the toys, you know, the ring, like

00:59:23.860 my wife would say to me, we got to go to the recital.

00:59:26.560 You go there, you're looking like a gangster.

00:59:28.140 You got the ring, the Rolex watch.

00:59:30.100 My daughter kept saying, I want to take daddy to show your daddy what he does at work.

00:59:35.440 What are you going to say?

00:59:36.440 Yeah, my name is Jack Falcone.

00:59:38.120 I am an associate in the Gambino crime family.

00:59:42.000 So you miss, and it does stick with you being undercover.

00:59:46.620 It's very seductive.

00:59:48.280 And I understand why guys go bad and things have done because not too many people could

00:59:55.360 do it or put up with it.

00:59:57.280 Jack, you worked undercover with the Gambino family.

01:00:02.360 You worked undercover with Colombians.

01:00:04.140 You worked undercover with Mexicans, Asians, Russians.

01:00:07.460 Which one of them were the most ruthless, vicious crime family you dealt with?

01:00:13.560 Colombian Mexicans.

01:00:15.140 Yeah, organized crime is a joke when you compare it to them.

01:00:18.940 These guys are serious.

01:00:20.300 It's all about huge amount of money that the mob never makes.

01:00:23.400 The violence, they'll not only come after you, Patrick, they'll come after your family.

01:00:27.740 I mean, they decapitate people.

01:00:30.420 They torture people.

01:00:31.900 When you deal with narcotics and the cartels, they could own, they could have the mobsters

01:00:42.880 do their laundry in prison.

01:00:44.660 I mean, they're just, they're two separate.

01:00:47.980 The mob has only become, in my opinion, the popular because of this romanticizing of that

01:00:54.560 Hollywood does, of the mob.

01:00:56.720 And for some reason, people love that glamour life, you know, the good fellas.

01:01:02.120 But when you're working out there with these cartels and these people that are so cunning,

01:01:07.540 like, for instance, when I met with a lot of people over drug deals, if they pick up a

01:01:13.080 surveillance, they're gone.

01:01:15.480 I mean, poof, you don't see them again.

01:01:17.520 They'll wind up somewhere in California.

01:01:19.700 Now, you're in a surveillance on a wise guy.

01:01:22.080 You miss him or he's wise to you.

01:01:24.880 Let me tell you where he's at.

01:01:26.140 He's at his gumata's house.

01:01:27.860 He's at his wife's house.

01:01:29.460 He's at a social club.

01:01:30.660 He's with these other guys playing hooker.

01:01:34.320 They're predictable.

01:01:36.340 But Colombians are not.

01:01:37.800 They're more sophisticated.

01:01:39.640 They're so compartmentalized where if you take one down, no one knows what the others are.

01:01:46.620 So they're like Dixie Cups.

01:01:48.200 They just, they make money and they get disposed.

01:01:51.180 So people do ask me that.

01:01:52.960 And Patrick, there is no comparison in my book.

01:01:56.020 The cartel's handover fit as far as more violent and ruthless and treacherous than the mob is or will ever be.

01:02:05.320 Wow.

01:02:05.660 They're willing to go places the other guys aren't.

01:02:08.000 Who did you, when you were working undercover, did you work with any of the main names in the 80s, 90s or 2000s?

01:02:13.480 I'm talking any of the El Chapo's, any of the Pablo's, any of the Medellin families, which one of the.

01:02:19.940 Yeah, we work for their people.

01:02:22.400 You know, they stayed in Colombia, of course.

01:02:24.120 So we drove the cartels from Pablo and, of course, all the others.

01:02:28.660 But we also, one of the interesting cases that really I've ever had, it was a two drug dealers that were featured twice on 60 Minutes.

01:02:37.740 There was the Du Bois of Sal Magluta and Willie Falcone.

01:02:42.040 They were the biggest drug traffickers in Florida.

01:02:45.140 And they were successful in not only killing so many people, they controlled the drug trade.

01:02:50.800 And what they did is we had this undercover case where I went in to a guy that one of the jurors identified as being dirty.

01:03:00.260 So we created a scenario where I approached him at his work at the airport in Miami.

01:03:05.580 And he admitted to taking a bribe of about a million dollars.

01:03:13.440 And the investigation that led from there also identified two other jurors.

01:03:19.240 And those two other jurors, this is in a federal courthouse in Miami, also were paid off by Sal Magluta and Willie Falcone.

01:03:28.260 Really an amazing group.

01:03:29.720 And I had to testify against Sal Magluta.

01:03:33.200 And I think they got a hundred and some odd years.

01:03:36.300 Willie Falcone decided to, I think he took a plea on that.

01:03:41.340 But yes, those are the guys from the 80s.

01:03:43.840 Those are the original Miami Vice guys, you know.

01:03:47.540 And that to me was probably one of the roughest guys.

01:03:50.100 And then, of course, Armando Fuentes Carillo, those guys from the Mexican cartel.

01:03:55.120 Very serious players.

01:03:57.260 One of the cases that we worked with DEA was that when the first heroin that was produced in Colombia, we were able to obtain.

01:04:08.520 And what happened in the past, the heroin came from Afghanistan or also came from China.

01:04:14.600 So the cartels brought in a bunch of scientists from China to process poppy seeds and they started growing it.

01:04:24.180 Well, the amount, the purity amount was, if not the same, but higher.

01:04:30.820 But the prices dropped from like a kilo going for like $150,000 down to $65,000.

01:04:38.020 And America was flooded with Colombian heroin.

01:04:41.820 And that was what that DEA FBI operation was very interesting because nobody believed that.

01:04:47.320 We had this tape conversation with the guy.

01:04:50.000 We brought it in and they said, there's no way Colombia is growing poppy.

01:04:54.340 And sure enough, that's what it's true.

01:04:57.460 Did you do anything with Rafa Cara Quintero or no?

01:05:00.140 No, not with Quintero.

01:05:01.340 Okay, got it.

01:05:02.320 You know, there's different communities that will say the following.

01:05:05.800 I'm curious to know what your thoughts are.

01:05:07.040 There are those that will say the most corrupt organization we have in America are cops.

01:05:17.220 Some will say FBI.

01:05:18.800 Some will say the mob.

01:05:20.540 Some will say others.

01:05:21.820 You know, who would you say is the most corrupt amongst those three?

01:05:25.100 And I'm talking the FBI of today.

01:05:26.560 The FBI of the J. Edgar Hoover days, you were, you know, looked up.

01:05:31.500 You were like, cool.

01:05:32.620 You were this.

01:05:33.240 It's a different era of FBI today than before.

01:05:35.640 Or who's more corrupt, if you were to say FBI, cops, or the, you know, mobs, or even the government?

01:05:42.760 You know, because I was an FBI agent and I've seen the men and women in the FBI, I can't label them that way.

01:05:53.040 You know, yes, there is, listen, there's corruption in everything.

01:05:57.500 There's corruption in IBM.

01:05:59.380 There's corruption.

01:06:00.100 We've handled, I did a lot of dirty cops in my investment.

01:06:03.340 I did five cases of dirty cops in my case.

01:06:07.180 We've also gotten dirty FBI agents.

01:06:09.700 So, yes, they exist, but they're a small amount.

01:06:12.400 And thank God that we police our own, that we conduct that.

01:06:16.520 But out of that group, I can't ever say that there is corruption within the FBI.

01:06:21.020 Yes, there is a bunch of idiots sometimes that do certain things that they shouldn't be involved in.

01:06:27.120 We're not a political agency, which is, we're a law enforcement agency.

01:06:32.020 And then the fact that police, there's also a corruption in that, just like it is with the FBI.

01:06:37.940 There's minor, and I think their internal affairs do a good job.

01:06:41.700 So my thing is always, out of those four, I would have to go with organized crime in any degree, whether it's the mob, whether it's the Crips, the Bloods, or just Asian or Russian, or whatever you want to call it.

01:06:54.820 So you would put it back on organized crime rather than, well, obviously, are you a proud, proud FBI agent, proud member of the FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation?

01:07:10.900 Yes.

01:07:12.040 I tell you my problem with that.

01:07:14.540 What I did with the FBI was good for the FBI, but it wasn't good for Jack Garcia.

01:07:20.380 You know, in hindsight, I should have never done all this type of work.

01:07:28.180 It should have been somebody who just stopped.

01:07:30.700 It's just, you shouldn't, you shouldn't be able to have worked so many cases and been around all these people.

01:07:37.760 So, and basically, at the end, you know, you're just sent home, you know, and so, that really, for me, it's what's the toughest part with the Bureau.

01:07:51.980 But I am, I do love the Bureau.

01:07:53.960 I know there are problems in the Bureau.

01:07:55.620 Some of it has to do with management.

01:07:57.620 I know I've worked with some great managers in the FBI, but I've also worked with people who have no business being managers.

01:08:05.040 As an undercover agent throughout the country, because I just didn't work in New York.

01:08:09.100 I did Florida, San Juan, Puerto Rico, Philadelphia, Newark.

01:08:13.200 Look, I've run into people that have no business being bosses, and I've seen it.

01:08:18.460 I've seen where guys even come up to me as case agents, and here I am, an experienced undercover, and you get some kid out of Quantico, and he's telling you, look, I wrote the script out.

01:08:29.180 This is what I want you to say.

01:08:31.360 I said, you've got to be kidding.

01:08:32.440 You're going to tell me what I've got to say.

01:08:33.680 Just tell me the parameters of what you've got to accomplish here.

01:08:36.440 I don't know what I'm going to say.

01:08:37.760 I have to look at the person, see what their body language is, see if I can go that extra yard.

01:08:43.280 I said, no, you say, hey, dude.

01:08:45.620 You say, hey, dude.

01:08:46.720 I never used that word.

01:08:48.200 So you're seeing a lot of people who are, I don't know where their training possibly could have been, but the agents that I work with were amazing, competent individuals.

01:09:00.500 I mean, I worked in a squad, just so you know, in Queens, which was Little Columbia.

01:09:04.300 We had 15 detectives, NYPD assigned full-time, and we had 15 agents.

01:09:10.440 Six of them became special agents in charge.

01:09:13.500 One of them became an assistant director.

01:09:15.740 The other one is a CNN law enforcement analyst.

01:09:19.060 So we had the creme de la creme, not only of the FBI, but the NYPD.

01:09:23.720 These were second and first grade detectives.

01:09:26.800 These guys, I go through any door.

01:09:29.120 I would work anything with them.

01:09:31.360 They were honest as could be.

01:09:32.740 And those are the people that I gravitated.

01:09:35.320 So when I got offered jobs as an undercover, I just didn't take it.

01:09:39.160 As much work as I went into telling me what the subject was, I want to know what you as an FBI agent is.

01:09:46.280 Because I know I'm going to have a problem with you if you're going to cough that attitude.

01:09:50.420 Yeah, it's interesting you say that.

01:09:51.940 I've sat down with a lot of FBI agents, and one of the things they all have said, most of them have said, is at the end of the career of the FBI agent, they don't take care of them.

01:10:01.740 It's just like, hey, great job.

01:10:03.200 Awesome.

01:10:03.780 Good luck to you.

01:10:04.420 Here's a couple thousand dollars.

01:10:05.560 Wish you nothing but the best.

01:10:06.600 Versus, you know, really taking care of the life you live being away from everybody.

01:10:12.060 You know, if you do your job right and you do what the FBI was meant to be there for rather than bullying people around who are just trying to live their lives, you serve the very important purpose, very important purpose to be an FBI agent.

01:10:27.220 You know, and I like the way you put it.

01:10:28.900 You didn't just kind of, you know, say, well, no, FBI, they're all honorable and they're all this.

01:10:33.000 You just kind of put it out there, say there's good, there's bad, there's the ugly.

01:10:35.540 But mostly what we did was good work that we did.

01:10:38.980 And inside of it, there were some bad people as well.

01:10:41.840 And I appreciate you sharing it from that perspective.

01:10:44.920 By the way, you know, any, you know, the one story that's always unique to people is Sinatra.

01:10:51.220 Did any stories of Sinatra, how did Sinatra ever make money with the mob?

01:10:56.520 And if he did, what was the format?

01:10:58.520 How was he used?

01:10:59.520 Did he use the mob?

01:11:00.540 Did they use him?

01:11:01.940 There's a lot of stories I've heard.

01:11:03.340 What did you hear yourself from De Palma?

01:11:05.660 I heard a lot of Sinatra and Dean Martin stories.

01:11:08.820 The classic Sinatra story that I heard, by the way, he played about four times at the Westchester premiere.

01:11:16.760 Two of those were free and he was scanned by Jimmy the Weasel Fradiano.

01:11:22.200 What they did was they knew that Frank wasn't impressed with women because he could get what he wanted.

01:11:28.400 It wasn't about fame and it wasn't about money, but he loved having awards.

01:11:33.600 So they came up with this plan of creating the Knights of Malta, Maltese Cross, to award it to him.

01:11:42.880 So here you go.

01:11:44.200 They create this fake artifact through the jewelry contact and say, Frank, we're going to award you with this.

01:11:51.440 And the Knights of Malta, you're going to be a member.

01:11:54.640 It's like a 7,000 year organization.

01:11:57.760 Has that been around that long?

01:11:59.800 And absolutely.

01:12:01.120 He bought his mother, the family.

01:12:03.460 They gave him the award, Greg said.

01:12:05.700 So now, the next week, they go back to Frank and say, Frank, listen, Knights of Malta is so glad to have you, but we're hurting financially.

01:12:13.960 Is there a way you could put up a couple of concerts for us?

01:12:17.160 He said, absolutely, anything for the Knights of Malta.

01:12:19.880 So what they do is they set up these two shows that were sold out, you know, and Greg DePalma was such a thief at the Westchester premiere that you would get your ticket and pay top dollar for what you thought would seat number one, A, which you thought was the front.

01:12:35.820 But what he did at Showtime at a dinner theater, he put like 10 chairs in front of each row.

01:12:41.500 So now you were row 11, you were in row 10.

01:12:45.580 So they sold the place out.

01:12:47.920 The money went into the coffers of the organized crime with Frank.

01:12:53.360 And actually, the story goes that he, when they took that photograph of Carlo Gambino and and all the others, Doonesbury did a one of their four panels of showing that photograph and saying how that same year, Frank Sinatra received the president's award, I think was from Reagan.

01:13:16.180 And here he is hobnobbing with organized crime.

01:13:19.840 The rumor about him that he vehemently denied that he was involved with the mob, but he knew all the players and all the players knew him and loved him.

01:13:30.140 So you wonder sometime, was he a patron saint of organized crime or was he a patsy?

01:13:36.180 You know, it's you have to figure it out.

01:13:38.340 But the Dean Martin stories were two.

01:13:39.980 They would come in, they would play golf, they go out in the town.

01:13:43.260 Dean did like to party.

01:13:44.820 I thought I was always make believe what you saw on the shows, but no, he enjoyed his cocktails.

01:13:49.840 Uh, and they would just go out and have a good time and make a lot of money with these guys.

01:13:55.120 Very cool.

01:13:56.220 Uh, last thing before we wrap up here, you know, you got now Michael Francis and Sammy creating content on YouTube.

01:14:03.100 They got channels.

01:14:03.960 They're doing very well.

01:14:04.900 I foresee these channels, uh, grown in the millions the way they're grown.

01:14:08.860 What do you think about the stories you're hearing, whether it's Sammy or you're hearing from Michael Francis creating content?

01:14:14.080 You know, I, I actually listened to Sammy's, uh, tape.

01:14:18.400 I was, uh, blown away.

01:14:20.200 I thought it was a very nice job, the production.

01:14:22.660 I, I want, I reached out to a couple of agents and said, boy, a lot of these FBI guys spoke.

01:14:28.520 Are these recorded previously?

01:14:30.680 And he, you know, cut and paste.

01:14:32.360 He says, no, they, uh, they provided the voices, you know, and these were top agents, you know, and the FBI, George Gabriel and, you know, uh, and the other guys.

01:14:42.780 So Sammy has a hook to get into that.

01:14:45.920 So kudos to him.

01:14:47.560 You know what I mean?

01:14:48.740 It's like, uh, he was able to get these guys as far as Michael is concerned.

01:14:53.320 I, you know, that's for another story, Patrick, I'm not buying it.

01:14:58.460 Let's just leave it at that.

01:14:59.540 Right.

01:14:59.820 What do you mean by that?

01:15:00.760 I'm not buying the religious act, but whatever it is, it is, you know, God bless him.

01:15:05.720 If it's true, God bless you, Michael.

01:15:07.560 You know, and, uh, I do know his father was a serious player.

01:15:11.760 I know Michael was legit as far as making money, not legit, but he made some serious money, uh, in the business.

01:15:19.640 I was taken aback a little by the show fear, uh, was it fear city that you get to see that show?

01:15:26.540 Yeah.

01:15:26.920 The, the four episodes or six episodes they had, uh, I don't know how many episodes it was.

01:15:31.460 Yes.

01:15:32.060 Yeah.

01:15:32.280 I was taken aback where they were discussing the hierarchy of the mob and they listed the boss, the underboss, but there was no concierge.

01:15:40.920 There was like totally eliminated.

01:15:42.840 And Michael didn't even mention it.

01:15:44.400 Michael should know because he was in the life.

01:15:46.520 They went from boss on the boss to captains and soldiers.

01:15:50.880 So the concierge is like, wasn't even there.

01:15:53.540 And then the other thing he told the story that I found kind of amazing how he was telling Tony Salerno, uh, that, you know, Tony Salerno asked him about, Hey, you're doing good with money.

01:16:03.900 Why don't you get together with, uh, you know, uh, get me some of my guys, some jobs.

01:16:09.500 So he says, yeah, I'll get you a job.

01:16:11.240 Well, how much he says, well, 1500, cause 1500 says, give him 500 and give me the thousand.

01:16:17.140 Now, Michael friends says he was a Columbo.

01:16:20.660 Okay.

01:16:21.400 Tony Salerno is Genovese West side.

01:16:25.240 If Carmine Persigle found out that Michael is given jobs to the Genovese crime family instead of his guys, what do you think that would happen?

01:16:35.540 So you don't think that's possible.

01:16:39.600 I mean, don't, they were doing gigs together many times that would share, even the gas business that was taking place.

01:16:46.840 A lot of the families were working together.

01:16:48.940 So there wouldn't be a massive feud, but the family, your first, the way I was taught in this life was that your family is your family.

01:17:00.540 This is your first family.

01:17:02.120 Yes.

01:17:02.580 You are causing all stride.

01:17:03.760 Everyone's causing all stride, but you are, that is your family.

01:17:07.120 So that comes first.

01:17:08.540 So if you're giving jobs, if you're a Columbo giving jobs to Gambino's or Genovese, whomever you're taking jobs, you're taking food from the table, from the other guys.

01:17:20.100 Now I was a boss.

01:17:21.800 Maybe I'm wrong.

01:17:22.560 Maybe Michael is a hundred percent.

01:17:23.980 Right.

01:17:24.200 But if I was a boss and find that out, I got an issue with Michael says, Hey, you know, what do you think we're doing here?

01:17:29.860 We got to take care of our guys.

01:17:31.600 You know, you, you come to me up.

01:17:34.240 Maybe I have nobody.

01:17:35.460 Maybe it's my job to tell Tony Salerno, I'm going to take care of, but it ain't your job to do that.

01:17:41.180 You know, it's amazing how much the world is enamored by mob stories.

01:17:46.140 It is so amazing.

01:17:47.540 It is so amazing.

01:17:48.660 They're enamored by the mob stores.

01:17:49.780 And I know you wrote a book called the making Jack Falcone, which we're going to put the link below.

01:17:56.180 You wrote this a while back, but obviously the stories are the stories.

01:17:59.000 If anybody is into the mob stores, we're going to put the link below for people to be able to order the book.

01:18:03.980 Jack, final thoughts.

01:18:05.060 I'm going to leave it to you.

01:18:05.640 What are your final thoughts here?

01:18:06.560 I know you made some interesting predictions here.

01:18:09.060 What, what a lot of people would disagree with you.

01:18:10.760 You said you think the mob is going to make a comeback, which most people say there's no way in the world that's going to happen.

01:18:16.160 I'll leave you with the final thoughts.

01:18:17.460 Well, I tell you, I, that's just my gut feeling and I got a big gut to go with that feeling.

01:18:25.560 So I'll tell you about it.

01:18:26.780 I just really believe that this is something that's going on.

01:18:29.440 I mean, you, the, when you're in the mob, you're, you do your basic stables, which is sports betting, which is extortion, which is loan sharking.

01:18:38.140 That, that hasn't stopped, especially during these pandemics, you know, loan sharks are making a killing on these things.

01:18:45.160 There are people out there who are looking to make money.

01:18:48.220 So as long as the mob is generating money, there's just no way that they're not going to grow exponentially.

01:18:55.140 They have to grow.

01:18:56.440 And especially knowing that when they look in their rear view mirror, the feds are not going to be behind them.

01:19:02.200 They're going to start looking to do so.

01:19:03.840 And listen, they're also constantly morphing.

01:19:06.520 One of the biggest stories that you should have, uh, talk about one day is the fact that the Gambino crime family

01:19:13.540 perpetrated the biggest internet fraud case ever to the tune of nearly a billion dollars.

01:19:20.400 And that's with Locasio, Richie, uh, Martino, Andrew Campos, who is now is still a captain.

01:19:28.600 And then you have Seth Mustafa.

01:19:30.840 These guys created a bank and then they were tapping into all the cell phones that we had,

01:19:37.300 where they had all these extra billing, 50 cents here, 50 there.

01:19:41.020 They made all of that money coupled with 800 numbers dial.

01:19:46.880 Uh, so as you could see, these guys, by the way, they did five years for this.

01:19:51.360 Can you imagine that?

01:19:52.440 Five years for a billion dollars.

01:19:54.420 Where's that line form?

01:19:56.240 You know?

01:19:57.040 So, but these guys are out there.

01:19:59.340 They're always morphing.

01:20:00.520 They're moving in directions that they want to, um, you know, to make money.

01:20:05.960 So it's no longer the traditional money.

01:20:08.660 It's wherever there's money to be made, you're going to find the mob.

01:20:13.660 They'll be back.

01:20:14.760 Like, like Arnold said, they'll be back.

01:20:17.700 The mob will be back.

01:20:18.880 Well, we will be watching closely to see if they'll be back.

01:20:22.220 But, uh, uh, Jack, thank you so much for being a guest and sharing your stories, man.

01:20:25.640 I really enjoyed it.

01:20:26.820 Likewise.

01:20:27.100 Thank you so much, Patrick.

01:20:28.500 I really, there's an honor.

01:20:30.000 All the best, my friend.

01:20:31.100 Take care.

01:20:31.560 Bye-bye.

01:20:31.820 Take care.

01:20:32.100 You know what I like about this one is the fact that here's an undercover FBI agent from

01:20:35.580 the era of 2000 and on.

01:20:37.620 Because Pistone, when I did the interview, was 80, uh, 76 to 81.

01:20:41.760 And you get some of the stories after that.

01:20:43.140 But this is a different era.

01:20:44.720 And a completely different perspective of how the story was told.

01:20:47.820 But, uh, I'm curious to hear your thoughts.

01:20:49.840 What you took away from it.

01:20:50.760 Comment below.

01:20:51.200 And if you enjoyed this interview, I have two other interviews I want you to watch.

01:20:53.600 One of them is with Joe Pistone, a.k.a.

01:20:55.600 Donnie Brasco, if you've never watched that, it's legendary.

01:20:58.620 It's long.

01:20:59.100 It's a couple hours.

01:21:00.080 Or you can watch Michael McGowan, another FBI agent who's got an incredible story of

01:21:05.400 what he had to do.

01:21:06.800 And he, his dealing went with Sicily, undercover, calling, negotiating with a boss and acting

01:21:12.280 tough.

01:21:12.780 A very different story that he had.

01:21:15.320 And on some questions when I pushed him, he got a little bit uncomfortable.

01:21:18.620 Didn't want to answer.

01:21:19.460 But he gave me enough information for you to be able to enjoy the interview that I did with

01:21:23.160 him.

01:21:23.300 So either one, click on these interviews to watch them.

01:21:26.520 And with that being said, take care, everybody.

01:21:28.420 Bye-bye, bye-bye, bye-bye.

Valuetainment - January 06, 2021

Undercover FBI Agent in the Gambino Family Takes Down 32 Mobsters

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