Crazy Joe Must Die!

Joe Yack told me: "I want that bastard's head. I want to roll it down President Street like a bowling ball so everybody can see it. . . . Watching him die, I'd actually Come." —Joe Luparelli

Stalking Joe Gallo was a frustrating task, like trying to catch a will-o'-the-wisp in a bottle. One of the reasons he was so hard to hit was that he followed no particular schedule, no daily routine. He changed his plans as often as he made them. He set up appointments, then failed to keep them or showed up hours or even days late.

Gallo had seen almost all the gangster movies ever made and he loved them all. His favorite was Kiss of Death, in which mad-dog Tommy Udo (Richard Widmark), with a sadistic gleam in his eyes and a maniacal laugh, pushes an old lady in a wheelchair down a steep flight of steps.

The scene fascinated Joey. He felt that was the way gangsters were supposed to behave and he did his best to live up to the Hollywood image, even compiling a wardrobe that might have been swiped from the Roaring Twenties set.

In 1950, shortly before his 21st birthday, Gallo was arrested for burglary and possession of burglary tools. He swaggered into court in a black, chalk-striped zoot suit, black shirt, white tie, stiletto-toed shoes and pearl-gray wide-brimmed hat. He glared at the judge and behaved in such an erratic manner that he was sent to Kings County Hospital for psychiatric examination.

The psychiatrists who checked him out concluded he was fairly intelligent but "incapable of understanding the charges against him." They considered him a dangerous psychotic, a paranoid schizophrenic with homicidal tendencies.

Their conclusion: "Joseph Gallo is presently insane."

From then on, he was Crazy Joe.

•

"Set up the hit for Luna's," Joe Yack said.

The Luna restaurant at 112 Mulberry Street in New York is neither as famous nor as fancy as some other Little Italy dining spots, such as Angelo's, Paolucci's or Villa Pensa. It's an unpretentious place, serving good food at reasonable prices. Gallo was a regular there in the old days, before he went to prison.

So many Mob men frequented Luna's that it sometimes resembled a Mafia lodge. Phil Luna, the owner, tried hard to stay out of the wars in which his customers frequently became embroiled. Gallo went all the way over from President Street in South Brooklyn to dine there, so Luna always greeted him with a smile and the best meal the house could provide. But he also welcomed the gunmen who were out to nail Joey. Gallo had more enemies than friends on Mulberry Street and Luna's catered impartially to both sides.

On the night of May 11, 1961, Gallo was arrested outside Luna's on the extortion charge that was to take him off the streets of New York for almost a decade.

When he returned, in the spring of 1971, a few old faces were missing from Luna's, but Frankie the Bug was still around and he welcomed Joey with a postmidnight feast that was almost like the bad old days.

Confident that Gallo would pay Luna's another visit very soon, Yack told Joe Luparelli to prepare an ambush.

Luparelli was a heavy-set, muscular man, about 5'10", 230 pounds, with a neck so thick that his head seemed to be resting on his torso. His weight had doubled since he had quit the burglary profession, but there were iron muscles under the lard and the extra poundage added to his menacing appearance. He was adept with a wide range of weapons—fists, blackjack, knife, garrot, gun. He had worked as a skull buster and had become a methodical, emotionless killer. Luparelli was a jack of almost all underworld trades and a master of several. He was exactly the sort of strong right arm the sly, ambitious Yack needed. He was selected as Yack's chauffeur-bodyguard.

Joe "Joe Yack" Yacovelli was a councilor of the crime family headed by Joe Colombo. "Joe Yack went to see the commission and when he came back, he told me the green light was on," says Luparelli. "All of the commission approved the contract on Joe Gallo."

Luparelli scouted the terrain and secured a vacant apartment in a tenement on Baxter Street, a block west of the restaurant. The rear window of the third-floor apartment overlooked Mulberry Street and Luna's. From that window, a marksman with a rifle could easily pick off anyone entering or leaving the restaurant.

Yack assigned ten men to take care of Gallo as soon as he showed up at Luna's. Three men were stationed inside the apartment, where they took turns sleeping and watching. Two more gunmen were on the street outside the restaurant, ready to blast Gallo if the sniper missed him. Other Colombo soldiers were in a getaway car, a backup car and two crash cars that would block traffic after the hit and foil police pursuit of the killers.

Luparelli was in charge of the operation. He says:

"I brought a carbine with a telescope sight up to the apartment and told the guys there to wait until the order came to whack Joe Gallo out. As soon as he came to Luna's, one of the guys on the street would signal to the guys in the apartment window.

"After I left the apartment, one of the guys started fooling around with the carbine and it went off. A bullet went through the wall and almost hit a Chinaman who lived next door. He started hollering. The shooters had to run out of the apartment and that whole scheme went down the drain."

•

No one, not even Joey himself, could accurately predict what he'd do next. He spent enough time in his headquarters on President Street to strengthen what was left of his old gang. Like a robber baron testing the defenses of a larger and richer fiefdom, he led his men on raids deep into Colombo territory, where they seized bits and pieces of rackets.

They wrested control of the South Brooklyn docks away from the Colombos and bludgeoned their way into handbooks, bars and night clubs owned by Colombo soldiers and captains. Police received reports that Crazy Joe was engaged in the same type of business infiltration that had sent him to prison.

Detective teams, known collectively as the Pizza Squad, had been stationed on President Street since the shooting of Joe Colombo and they observed everyone who entered or left the gang's headquarters. They soon knew by sight every member of the gang, every resident of the block, every car normally parked there. When a strange car appeared, the license plate was checked out immediately.

Partly to avoid such scrutiny and partly because his outlook on life had broadened considerably while he was in prison, Joey moved away from South Brooklyn, although he maintained his headquarters there and kept in touch by phone or in person every day.

From former Gallo gangsters now enrolled in the Colombo organization, Yack learned that Gallo had moved to West 14th Street, the northern boundary of Manhattan's colorful Greenwich Village.

"We found out he was living in the Village and hanging out in a couple of bars there," Luparelli says. "We tried to set something up, but he was too cautious.

"So now, Junior came out with an idea. The one place Gallo had to go, whether he wanted to or not, was the parole office. Junior said, 'Why don't we kill him when he goes to report to his parole officer?' "

The parole office of the New York State Department of Correctional Services is in a modern, five-story building on West 40th Street in the heart of the Garment District, one of the city's most congested areas. From nine to five every weekday, the narrow streets are clogged with cars, trucks and handcarts loaded with racks of clothing. The parole office also is around the corner from the mammoth Port Authority Bus Terminal, which brings additional thousands of people into the already overcrowded district every day.

"If we hit him at the parole office," Luparelli inquired, "how are we going to get away in all the traffic? We could be stuck there forever."

"Don't worry," Junior replied. "We'll use a motorcycle. McIntosh and me will handle the hit. I'll shoot him myself, with a shotgun. Then I'll jump on the bike and go."

Yack approved the daring plan. If all went well, it would be one of the most sensational Mob murders of all time. Luparelli says:

"Yack sent 17 guys up near the parole office. Most of them were associates, not family members. They were nobody that Joe Gallo knew, but they all knew Gallo. When he was in jail, he lost contact with people's faces. Yack didn't use no made guys for this job, outside of Junior.

"The main thing was to get out of the Garment District and all that traffic after Gallo got zapped. They figured all they would need were a couple of guys on foot and some cars laid around to fuck up the traffic even worse than it was.

"If Junior could stay on the motorcycle and not run into any trucks or hand trucks or anything, he should be able to get out fast. We went into the parole office and looked around and talked to some guys who had to report there, so we knew the whole layout—how many elevators, how many exit doors, how many guards in the building. Gallo would probably feel safe there, so Junior would just walk up and blast him.

"Outside of the traffic, the only problem was that Gallo knew Junior. If he saw him, he'd know what was up. But Junior figured Gallo wouldn't recognize him in a motorcycle outfit, with the helmet and goggles and everything. Gallo wouldn't expect anything like that. He didn't even know Junior could ride a bike.

"Yack could hardly wait. He said, 'I hope to God they get this guy. I'd like to have him in my hands. I'd make him beg for his life. I want to see him crawl. Watching him die, I'd actually come.'

"Well, the call came that told us the day Joe Gallo was supposed to be at the parole office. We all went up there and hung around all day. Joe Gallo didn't show up. Later, we got word he had put it off to the next week, so we went back then. Joe Gallo didn't show up again."

Captain Nick Bianco, a former Gallo gunman who was still on friendly terms with him and his crew, was given the assignment of luring Joey into a trap. Bianco got in touch with the Gallos' senior capo, John "Mooney" Cutrone. Mooney asked him: "What's going on here? Why are we fighting?"

Bianco said Mooney suggested holding a sit-down in Junior's Restaurant, a popular Brooklyn rendezvous on busy Flatbush Avenue, to begin peace negotiations. This idea appealed to Yack.

"OK," he said. "Tell Mooney I'm willing to sit down with him and Joe Gallo. Tell him to ask Gallo to please come. Promise him nothing will happen. Take care of the arrangements and set a time for the sit-down. Tell Mooney if they want peace, he and Gallo can have it.

"When Gallo comes there, I want you to kill him.

"When his car pulls up, go out and greet him. Go up to him with a big smile and let him have it right there, outside the place. If anybody gets in front of the gun, shoot through them."

Bianco drove up to Nyack a few days later and told Yack the latest Gallo liquidation plan wouldn't work any better than the previous attempts.

"Mooney told Gallo about the peace meet," Bianco explained. "Gallo said he wouldn't go to no meeting. He said Mooney could take up whatever he wants, he don't give a fuck, but he's not going."

•

Gallo's death was becoming an obsession with Yacovelli. He talked about it constantly, almost drooling with anticipation, the way some men talk about seducing a particularly desirable and elusive girl. Gallo not only was still alive but was growing more arrogant every day. Those who watched him swagger through Colombo turf in Brooklyn and Little Italy concluded he must either have a death wish or consider himself immortal.

He went into the restaurants, bars and (continued on page 188)Crazy Joe(continued from page 86) night clubs where the Colombo clan congregated. He even attended a wake at a Brooklyn funeral parlor owned by Joe Colombo, Sr., and some of his business associates. If the corpse had suddenly jumped out of the casket, the mourners couldn't have been more startled than they were by the unexpected presence of Crazy Joe. He seemed to be daring the Colombos to try to tag him.

"We heard Joe Gallo was all over town, but he never stood in one place long enough for us to get at him," says Luparelli.

The last place they expected to find him was in a Mulberry Street social club where several Colombo gunmen hung out, but Joey could always be counted on to do the unexpected.

On a blustery March night in 1972, he swaggered into the club with his brother Albert and two bodyguards, Pete the Greek and Roy-Roy Musico.

"This was Joe the Wop's old place," Luparelli says. "Joe the Wop was a boss and he died and this guy Georgie took over the place. He's no boss or nothing. He just bought the place.

"Joe Gallo walked in like he owned the joint. He didn't have a gun on him, because he was on parole, but his brother and bodyguards all showed guns. There was a lot of people there, drinking and playing cards. Joe Curly, Frankie the Bug and other guys.

"Joey went up to Georgie and ordered drinks for everybody. Georgie was dying to get away from him, because he figured any minute a couple of Colombos would come in and bullets would be flying.

"Joe Gallo started shooting off his mouth, talking loud and mean: 'I don't give a shit about no Colombos. I'll kill anybody who's in my way.'

"Frankie the Bug tried to quiet him down. Everybody stopped playing cards and looked at him. If they had any respect at all for Joe Yack, they would have killed him right there, but nobody done nothing.

"Georgie told Sonny Pinto about it later and Sonny told Joe Yack. Yack said: 'Those assholes. They give him conversation? They should spit on him and blow him away.' "

March was a very busy month for Crazy Joe. He married Sina Essary, a slim, brown-haired divorcee he had first met in the elevator of the 14th Street apartment house where they both were living.

On Saturday night, March 18, Joey took his bride, his mom and his sister to the San Su San night club in Mineola, Long Island, to hear singer Jimmy Roselli. They were accompanied by bodyguards Pete the Greek and Bobby Darrow. The San Su San was considered Colombo territory; one of its unofficial owners reportedly was Colombo capo John "Sonny" Franzese, who was serving time for bank robbery.

About an hour after the Gallo party arrived, several other President Street pistoleros came in and were seated on the opposite side of the club. The presence of such a large Gallo turnout caused speculation that Joey was casing the club in preparation for a take-over attempt. It wouldn't be the first Colombo enterprise he had muscled into since his parole.

•

Joey may have convinced his bride that he was going straight, but the cops and mobsters who knew him best never had the slightest doubt that his ultimate goal was the same as it had always been—to be the richest racketeer in town. Under the fresh layers of culture and respectability, Tommy Udo was alive and well.

Joey left his President Street headquarters around six on Thursday evening. April sixth. Pete the Greek and Darrow drove him home to 14th Street and left him there. Lisa, Sina's ten-year-old daughter, had gone to the theater, so the bride and groom dined alone.

Joey's sister, Carmella Fiorello, brought Lisa home around 11 o'clock. Around the same time, Pete the Greek arrived at the Gallo apartment with a date, Edie Russo, and Darrow.

They all decided to go uptown to the Copacabana to celebrate Joey's birthday and see Don Rickles, the acid-tongued comic.

The three men, three women and Lisa climbed into a black Cadillac and drove to 60th Street. The Copa maître de greeted them like visiting royalty and ushered them to the best table in the house.

Rickles had once worked at a club owned by Joe and Larry Gallo. After the second show, the comedian went over to Joey's table, sat down and started talking about old times. Night-club columnist Earl Wilson and his secretary also joined the party and drank a champagne toast to the birthday boy.

When they left the Copa shortly after four A.M., Joey told Darrow to take Wilson's secretary home in a cab. That left Gallo with only one bodyguard. Joey, Pete the Greek, the three women and Lisa got into the Caddy and cruised downtown to Mulberry Street for a late snack, but Luna's was closed.

The only place open was a new seafood restaurant, Umberto's Clam House. "Let's try it," Joey said.

While the Gallo party was at the Copa, Luparelli had dropped into King Wah, a Chinese restaurant on Mulberry, a few doors south of Canal Street. The restaurant, formerly a Mob social club, was owned by Richard Pallatto and his Chinese-American wife, Mona. Mobsters frequently stopped there when they felt like "eating Chinese" or simply sipping Scotch in an atmosphere slightly more exotic than their neighborhood hangouts.

Sonny Pinto was at the bar with Philip "Fat Fungi" Gambino, a corpulent ex-con who was on parole. Luparelli had a couple of drinks with them, then walked up the street to Umberto's Clam House, on the corner of Mulberry and Hester. Umberto's was the latest link in the chain of dining and drinking establishments owned by Matty the Horse. It was run by his two brothers.

A small, white-walled, brightly lit place with a dozen butcher-block tables and a diner type of counter, it was so new that it didn't have a license to sell alcoholic beverages. Fish nets and plastic life preservers decorated the walls.

"Matty the Horse was there and Tony, who owned the bar down the block, and another guy, Charley," Luparelli says. "We were talking when we heard a commotion outside. Johnny the Ice Man was arguing with a uniformed cop. We went out to look. Then who drives up in a big black Cadillac but Joe Gallo and Pete the Greek. They had some women with them.

"I never knew there was a kid in there. I only seen them two and the women. I never seen the kid. As soon as I saw who was in the car, I turned my head so Gallo and the Greek couldn't get ahold of my face. They both knew me from before and I figured maybe Pete the Greek knew I'm with Joe Yack.

"Joe opens the Cadillac and says, 'How's the seafood, any good?'

"Matty says, 'Yeah. Pretty good.'

"He wasn't so anxious for Gallo to go in there, but he didn't want to say anything that would make him mad. I turned my back and went down to King Wah. Pinto and Fat Fungi are still there.

"I said, 'Guess who's in the clam house?'

"Sonny says, 'Who?'

" 'Un Paz [a nickname derived from the Italian words un pazzo, the crazy one]. Un Paz is there.'

"Sonny says, 'Who Un Paz?'

"I says, 'Joe Gallo's in there with Pete the Greek.'

"Sonny says, 'That son of a bitch. He's got some nerve, coming into the neighborhood all the time. We're going to load up and we're going to hit him now. We'll whack him out right there.' "

Two other hoods had joined Sonny and Fungi while Luparelli was at Umberto's. Luparelli knew them only as Cisco and Benny, brothers who were in the Colombo unit headed by Franzese. The Pallattos were still serving drinks, although it was now well past the legal closing time.

Pinto sent the brothers and Pallatto out to get guns. While they were gone, Luparelli inquired what his role in the whack-out would be. As he was walking with the aid of a cane, he couldn't do anything that required fleet footwork.

"All I want you to do is drive one of the cars," Sonny said. "I don't want Fungi to do nothing, neither. He's out on parole."

The brothers and Pallatto returned with four guns—two .38s, a .32 and a .22-caliber automatic. One of the brothers offered the .22 to Luparelli, but he declined to accept it, because "it looked so rusty I was afraid it might blow up in my hand if I squeezed the trigger."

"You don't need a gun," Sonny said. "Just stay with the car."

Meanwhile, the Gallo party had been seated around a table at the rear of the restaurant, a few feet from the side door on Mulberry Street. Gallo was sitting between his bodyguard and his sister, facing the wall. Opposite them, Sina sat between Lisa and Edie, their backs to the wall.

Matty the Horse had followed them into the restaurant. He sat on a stool at the far end of the counter, near the kitchen, with his broad back to the Gallo party. After glancing at the menu, Gallo shouted at the nervous restaurateur: "Hey, Matty, order for us, will you? You know what's good here."

Matty consulted the cook, then ordered shrimp and scungilli salad all around. Gallo liked it so much that, when it was gone, he called for another serving. He and his companions washed down the seafood with soft drinks and coffee. They were halfway through the second round of shrimp and scungilli when two cars pulled up outside.

"We could see Joe Gallo and his family sitting on the side," Luparelli says. "I didn't know who the women were. I didn't know it was his wife and sister. I thought they was just broads.

"Pinto parked his car right outside the restaurant. I swung my car around to block off the intersection of Hester and Mulberry. We each used our own cars.

"Cisco and Benny were with Sonny. Fat Fungi was with me. Sonny and the brothers went in the side door on Mulberry Street and started firing at Gallo."

Besides the Gallo group, ten other persons were in the restaurant when the gunmen entered—seven customers, a waiter, the cook and Matty the Horse. When the shooting started, they all hit the deck. Customers dived under tables and chairs. The waiter and cook sought refuge behind the counter, Matty ran into the kitchen and threw himself face down onto the floor, covering his head with his hands.

Pete the Greek, on Gallo's left and closest to the side door, was the first to see Pinto come in. As he turned his head to warn Joey, he heard Sonny shout, "Die, motherfucker!" and the roar of gunfire as Sonny and the brothers began their barrage.

Pete the Greek tried to draw his own gun, a .25-caliber automatic, but he had trouble getting it out of his pocket and dodging slugs at the same time. Instinctively, he ducked and a bullet slammed him to the floor.

Two bullets tore through Gallo's back. One struck his spine; the other severed one of the two main arteries to his brain. He jumped up, knocked over the heavy table and staggered through the restaurant to the front door. A third bullet hit him as he reached the street and two more pierced his clothes without touching his body. He had almost made it to his Cadillac when he toppled over in the street and died.

"Pete the Greek got shot in the ass when he ducked under the table. He wasn't supposed to duck, but he did. Then everybody came running out. Sonny and the brothers jumped in Sonny's car. Pete the Greek came out the side door and fired at the three of them. They fired back as they drove away," Luparelli says.

Matty the Horse was still sprawled on the kitchen floor. Thinking he had arranged the ambush, Pete the Greek hauled him to his feet.

"How could you do this in front of his wife and kid?" Pete demanded.

"I didn't have nothing to do with it," Matty insisted.

Luparelli and Fat Fungi were watching from their car. They had a clear view of the restaurant kitchen from the open side door.

"Pete the Greek pulled his pistol and stuck it in Matty's face," Luparelli says. "He kept pulling the trigger—click, click, click. Matty thought he was dead, but the gun was empty.

"Me and Fungi saw Joe Gallo come out the front door and stumble and fall in the middle of Hester Street, near his Cadillac. Pinto and the two brothers ran out after him and took off when they saw him drop. Then Gallo's sister and wife and the kid came out. They were all screaming."

Pete heard the screams and realized, for the first time, that his boss was dead.

"Pete the Greek came out, shoving Matty the Horse in front of him for a shield. When he seen the body, he let go of Matty and ran to Joe Gallo. Then Pete the Greek fainted, right there on the street."

•

After casually carrying out the Gallo contract, Pinto and his helpers went back to King Wah and resumed their drinking, as if nothing had happened. Luparelli and Fat Fungi joined them there a few minutes later.

"Sonny did his own driving and everything," Luparelli says. "That's how crazy he was. When Fat Fungi and I met him in King Wah, Sonny said he wanted to stay there awhile. He wanted to drink some more. I said, 'Sonny, we can't stay here. We've got to get out of here. In a few minutes, there'll be cops all over the area.'

"Sonny didn't think nothing of what he had just done. That's how he was. There wasn't any real plan when it happened. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. Sonny just decided to do it there and then while we had the chance.

"He told the two brothers to get rid of the guns. We dropped the brothers off at Center Market and Grand Street, on the corner below police headquarters. Then we drove Sonny's car down to Lafayette Street and put it in front of his mother's place. It had a flat tire. One of Pete the Greek's bullets must have hit the tire, so now we decided to use my car.

"Pinto lay down on the back seat and took a nap while I drove up to Nyack. Fat Fungi sat up front next to me. We got to Nyack around six, six-thirty in the morning. Joe Yack was asleep. He got up and came to the door when we rang the bell."

"Who's there?" Yack asked from behind the door.

"Joe Pesh," said Luparelli, using his Italian nickname.

"What are you doing here at this hour?"

"We got him," Fungi said. "We got him."

Yack opened the door. When he saw the Mulberry Street trio on his threshold, he didn't know what to think. Everybody started talking at once.

"Just a minute," Yack said. "Slow down. Don't say nothing out in the hall here, where people might be listening. Let's go inside."

They all went inside and Yack put the chain lock on the door. Then he turned to his chauffeur-bodyguard.

"Joe, what did you do when you drove up here?"

"I checked in back and all. I watched the mirror. There was nobody behind us. I made sure we weren't tailed."

"OK, now tell me the story."

When he heard what had happened, Yack's dark eyes flashed with excitement. "He kissed Sonny on the mouth," Luparelli says, "because that's a sign of thanks for a killing.

"He said to Sonny, 'In my heart, I knew you were the one who'd kill that son of a bitch.' Then he asked who else was there. I told him, 'Matty, the cook, a few customers, a couple of broads, Pete the Greek.'

"Sonny said, 'I didn't see nobody but Gallo. All I saw was that fuck's face and we were shooting at him.' "

Now Yack's initial elation was replaced by a worried look. He started firing questions at his impulsive henchmen.

"How do you know he's dead?"

"Well, we hit him," Sonny replied. "We musta hit him a few times. And he went down. He must be dead."

"All right. What about Pete the Greek? Is he dead?"

"I don't know. I don't think so."

"Why ain't he dead?"

"Well, maybe he is. We shot at him, too. He fell on the floor. He must have been hit, too."

"You better pray he's dead. If he ain't, we're in trouble. Sonny, listen to me. If he's still alive, he'll be locked up and by accident—accidentally on purpose—he'll spill who done it. He'll tell it to somebody. They'll tell somebody else. Word will be out that you're the guy.

"I'm not worried about the women. Those broads won't know your faces. Pete the Greek is the only one who could get you. Jesus Christ, if only you guys had killed him, everything would be all right."

Yack switched on the radio, tuned in an all-news station and told his men to keep quiet. They all sat down near the radio and listened until they heard a bulletin: "Joe Gallo, head of Brooklyn's notorious Gallo gang, was reported shot early today at a restaurant in Manhattan's Little Italy section. Police are investigating. Further details will be announced as soon as they are available."

"They don't mention he's dead," Yack said, staring into the faces of his henchmen, as if trying to read their minds.

"Joe, we shot this guy," Luparelli replied. "He come out the door, stumbled and fell flat on his face in Hester Street. Fungi and I saw him. He went down and he didn't move. We thought he had it."

"You thought? Why the hell didn't you make sure? He could still be alive. If he's alive, we're gonna have to go in the hospital and kill him there. I don't give a fuck how many people are around. We'll go in the hospital and kill him."

By then it was daylight, the drinks and the excitement were wearing off and, as the alcohol and adrenaline levels dropped, the soldiers suddenly felt exhausted.

Luparelli says, "Pinto lay down on the couch and went to sleep. Fat Fungi lay down on the rug. I went to the kitchen and started making coffee. We was all quiet. Yack was walking up and down in front of the radio.

"Then the news flash came—Joe Gallo is dead.

"Fat Fungi and Sonny jumped up. Everybody started feeling good again. We all kissed Sonny Pinto on the mouth."

Joe Luparelli later learned that Joe Yack wanted to have him killed. He fled to Santa Ana, California, where he turned himself in as a Federal informant. He now lives somewhere in the United States with a false identity under the Department of Justice's Witness Protection Program.