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New York Times 10/12/75 By Nicholas Gage Article on major role played by organized crime in financing and distribution of pornographic films, 1st of 2 articles on underworld involvement in pornographic films and periodicals. Organized crime has heavily infiltrated pornographic film business and is reaping huge profits from such successes as Deep Throat, The Devil and Miss Jones and Wet Rainbow. Instances where they do not have direct financial share in film, as in case of Behind the Green Door and The Life and Times of Xaviera Hollander, crime figures have pirated film and distributed it illegally, earning money without any investment. Successes of several films has given several pornographic moviemakers with Mafia connections money to go into production and distribution of legitimate films. Capt Lawrence Hepburn of NYC Police says if trend continues organized crime will become major force in film indus in several yrs. James Buckley, co-founder of pornographic newspaper Screw, and brothers David and Fredrick, formed co to produce and distribute both pornographic and legitimate films. Have produced or distributed films Flesh Gordon, Saturday Night at the Baths and Bambina. Openly acknowledge their dealings with Mafia. Cases involving threats and injuries by Mafia to filmmakers noted including murder of Jack Molinas and disappearance of Philip Mainer. Major Mafia figures involved in distribution and production of pornographic films are Michael Zaffarano, Joseph Gentile and Anthony and Joseph Peraino. Zaffarano is listed by Justice Dept as capt in Mafia family of Joseph Bonanno and is involved with Stu Segall Assocs, producer of hard-core feature Defiance. Gentile is listed as member of Joseph Colombo Mafia family and prefers to finance production of pornographic films using legitimate producers as front men as in case of film Wet Rainbow. Peraino brothers are listed as members of Joseph Colombo family and use as main front man Robert J DeSalvo who set up Shore Distributors, involved in distribution of film The Devil and Miss Jones. Pirating of film Behind the Green Door from producers Arthur and James Mitchell noted. DeSalvo, head of Gulf Distributors, also wanted distribution rights to film The Life and Times of Xaviera Hollander but world distribution rights had already been assigned to Robert Sumner, who began distributing film on Dec 4, '74, and sold rights for 5-wk engagement to 5 theaters in upstate NY owned by Herbert Nitke. Nitke informer Sumner of pirated editions of film that were turning up nearby. Deep Throat was produced by Anthony and Louis Peraino and Gerard Damiano, whose interest was later bought out.Robert DeSalvo was ultimately given natl distribution rights. 10/13/75 Article on major role played by organized crime in distribution of pornographic periodicals, 2d of 2 articles on underworld involvement in pornographic films and periodicals. Largest of such publications is Screw, founded in '68 by Al Goldstein and James Buckley, with circulation of 85,000 and published by Milky Way Productions. Total circulation of 12 leading pornographic papers, which include Pleazure, Hooker, San Francisco Ball, Whips & Chains, Hot Stuff and Smut, is about 300,000. All papers are distributed by same 2 cos, Star Distributors and Astro News. Such papers had difficulty finding distributors when they started and ultimately turned to cos connected with organized crime. Police officials and Fed agents who have been investigating organized crime involvement in pornography indus say that publishers of such papers have to give these cos higher share of profits than is customary or outright interest in their papers to obtain distribution. 2 distributing cos reptdly have strong Mafia ties. Officers of Star include Theodore Rothstein, Robert DiBernardo and Nathan Cramer. DiBernardo is listed by NYC police and Justice Dept as member of Mafia family of Sam DeCavalcante, based in NJ. Astro is operated by Richard A DiMatteo, who is listed by police as member of Gallo faction of Joseph Colombo family. Peter Diapoulas, former member of Gallo group, said DiMatteo was front at Astro for Albert Gallo, leader of Gallo group who actually controls co. Goldstein comments on series of events that led Screw to seek out aid of organized crime. Goldstein por (L). 8/18/75 MY Times: Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley's intervention has brought about truce in dispute between city atty Burt Pines and police chief Edward M Davis concerning Davis's implied criticism of Pines's office. Davis charged that 'an elected official who accepts money from pornographers, homosexual orgns and any other kind of illegal outfit' is soft on prosecuting those individuals. Complained that in last 2 yrs there has been cessation of prosecution of pornography in Los Angeles at time when Mafia is moving into pornography indus. Observers interpret Davis criticism as aimed at Pines, whose policy has been to give victimless crimes low priority. Pines defends his conviction record. He and Gov Edmund Brown criticize Davis statement. Bradley decided to mediate private discussion between Davis and Pines. 2/15/80 Michael Zaffarano, reputed organized crime figure with long record of involvement in pornographic films, dies in his Times Square office, apparently of heart attack, less than 1 hour after Federal agents had set out to arrest him in nationwide dragnet of suspects in pornography and film pirating industries. Louis Peraino Jr, Joseph Peraino and Robert Di Bernardo, described by officials as key figures in illicit film production and distribution, are arrested and more than 50 master copies of pirated films, including Kramer vs Kramer and The Deer Hunter, are seized in metropolitan area as agents fan out in 10 states. Action is culmination of 2 1/2-year inquiry. Kenneth B Walton, special agent in charge of organized crime and criminal division of FBI, announces arrests at news conference. Representatives of Motion Picture Assn of America praise investigation. FBI agents, in raids authorized by search warrants, invade offices of Star Distributors, K.E.D. Productions and Arrow Film and Video. 2/15/80 Washington Post An FBI undercover operation based in Miami has cracked a nationwide conspiracy to control the multibillion-dollar pornogrpahy industry, federal officials said yesterday. A federal grand jury in Miami returned indictments against 45 persons from 10 states, following a 2 1/2-year investigation in which FBI agents opened a phony mail order house in Miami to make contact with the pornographers. Among those charged with conspiracy and interstate transportation of obscene material yesterday were four men reputed to be the country's major traffickers in dirty books and movies. They are Rubin Sturman of Cleveland, Michael (Mickey) Zaffarano and Robert (Debe) Di Bernardo, both known as organized crime figures from New York, and Harry Mohney of Duran, Mich. The same investigation resulted in additional indictments againt 13 persons of film-pirating charges. They allegedly stole and made illegal videotape cassettes of such major motion pictures as "Star Wars," "The Godfather" and "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." The pornography indictments were described by federal law enforcement officials as the largest single attack yet on the pornography industry. "We feel we've knocked out the entire major production and distribution chain in an organized crime controlled industry," a top official said. Some Justice Department attorneys acknowledged that questions were raised about the worth of trying to enforce obscenity laws because they usually rank low in priority when it comes to allocating limited federal manpower. A lawyer familiar with the case said: "We didn't go out trying to enforce morality. We were looking for industries controlled by elements of organized crime, and felt pornography was one of them." A defense lawyer said last night that he was outraged to have his client lumped in the indictment with alleged organized-crime figures. Richard Chesney of Oakland, Calif., said, "It appears to me that the Department of Justice attorneys in Florida have orchestrated this case to paint every defendant with a brush of organized crime even though they are not connected with organized-crime figures in any war nor have they had any involvement in most of the acts alleged." Chesney said that his client, Roland Boudreault, openly distributes pornographic material from San Francisco. He said the FBI hardly needed an undercover operation to determine that. The Miami undercover operation -- called "Miporn" by the FBI -- began in August 1977 after the bureau took over a similar storefront operation from Dade County organized-crime investigators. The original base of operations was a warehouse called Golde Coaste Specialties Inc....made to appear to be a mail order house dealing exclusively in pornographic material. Two undercover agents began infiltrating the pornography industry, officials said, and eventually traveled all over the country meeting top manufacturers and wholesalers. At times the leaders of the illegal industry met at convention settings. The indictment said, for instance, that 22 of those charged met in Las Vegas early last month. The alleged pornographic kings would use their own cover, a legitimate film distributor or electronics show, to attend such meetings, according to one official. The indictment alleged that it was part of the conspiracy for the leadership to control the industry by establishing "watch lists" of suspected government agents and to use threats and force to collect debts and enforce their own ban of unauthorized duplication of the allegedly obscene films. At one point in the undercover operation the two FBI agents had to leave the warehouse because of threats from some of their distributors. "They were late paying their bills and the boys didn't like it," a source said. Officials emphasized that the FBI agents did not actually sell any of the films or magazines they bought. The project cost about $400,000 altogether, with funding provided by the FBI, the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration and the Motion Picture Association of America, officials said. In their nationwide travels the undercover agents visited and made deals with alleged pornography dealers in New York, Cleveland, Chicago, Las Vegas and Los Angeles. Arrest warrants were issued for persons in several states, including Louis Guglielmi of Baltimore. Until yesterday, the government's most significant case against a pornography distributor involved Michael Thevis of Atlanta, who was convicted of racketeering and conspiracy to murder a governemnt witness. Those charged in the film-pirating case yesterday also face severe penalties under racketeering statutes. Most of those charged, however, face the less serious charge of interstate trafficking in "obscene, lewd, lascivious, and filthy films and magazines." 2/19/80 Christian Science Monitor: The nation's biggest-ever crackdown on purveyors of hard-core pornography is yielding these results: * It lays to rest any doubts about the vastness of the pornography business in the United States. It is, FBI director William H. Webster says, a $4 billion-a-year industry. * It reveals the national scope and sophisticated organization of the US pornography trade. Key producers and distributors of pornography gather together about twice a year from cities such as Los Angeles; San Francisco; Chicago; Cleveland; Providence, Rhode Island, and Miami to discuss legal strategies and sales, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. * It erases any doubt about the control, sometimes through violent means, of organized crime over the pornography trade. Several key persons among the 45 indicted here last week as the result of a 2 1/2-year undercover investigation by the FBI have been identified by federal sources as prominent members of organized crime "families," often known as the Mafia. These figures, the FBI now alleges, control the pornography industry in the US through "threats of force and use of force." Past investigations have pointed to the murders of persons believed to have incurred the enmity of Mafia pornography dealers. The FBI's offensive against the nation's biggest pornography producers and distributors also ends, at least for now, a lengthy record of reluctance on the part of the FBI and many local law enforcement agencies to crack down on pornography. There are several factors behind the previous reluctance: First, there has been an acceptance of pornography by a growing part of the public. This acceptance is seen in the rapidly expanding pornography industry, an industry ultimately supported by individual buyers across the nation. To what extent this has influenced decisions by law enforcement officials is difficult to assess. But FBI officials here admit pornography has not been a very high priority for the FBI or most other law enforcement agencies in recent years. Second, the most common antipornography strategy, closing down specific retail outlets, has largely resulted in "piddling cases," says William Nettles Jr., the No. 2 FBI man here. A store may be closed, but the owners often face mild penalties and may reopen under another name, he says. The attempt to detect obscene materials in the mail is difficult because it "takes almost an act of Congress to mess with the mails," Mr. Nettles said in an interview. Finally, the legal definition of obscenity has not been -- and still is not -- precise. 1/5/82 NY Times: Two people - one of them a woman storing laundry in a hallway
closet in her home - were killed during a gangland attempt to assassinate
a convicted pornographer and Mafia member last night on a quiet, residential
side street in the Gravesend section of Brooklyn, the police said. According to law enforcement officials and court records, Joseph Peraino
Sr. has a long history of involvement with organized crime. Along with
a brother, Anthony, Mr. Peraino has been described in court papers as
one of the major figures involved in the production and distribution of
hard-core pronography. 11/26/82 Washington Post: In Japan, for instance, Smith began negotiations to seek a mutual assistance arrangement under which the United States could provide and receive investigative intelligence on the "Yakuza," the Japanese equivalent of the Mafia. The Yakuza is believed to be expanding its operations, including loan-sharking, pornography, extortion and narcotics trafficking, into Hawaii and the West Coast. 12/18/82 NY Times: The Sun Belt has begun to rival the North in the level and sophistication of criminal activity, say law-enforcement officials across the South. The growth is marked not only by the influx of drugs, particularly marijuana and cocaine, the officials say, but also by organized car theft, prostitution and pornography rings and complex fraud and money-laundering operations. With it has emerged a new criminal class, which some Southern law officials, for lack of a better term, term the Dixie mafia. The expansion of crime in the Sun Belt was illustrated by the evidence presented in the trial of Charles Voyde Harrelson, who was convicted Tuesday in San Antonio of killing a Federal district judge for $250,000. Unlike La Cosa Nostra, the tightly organized criminal hierarchy, the Dixie version is a loose confederation of car thieves, burglars, contract killers, operators of prostition and pornography rings, drug smugglers and distributors. Although the traditional organized crime usually associated with the mafia has long existed in areas such as Miami and New Orleans, it has never achieved the influence that it has in the North, according to law-enforcement officers. And while the traditional mafia is organized in groups called families, each generally with its own area and, in some cases, criminal speciality, Southern criminal cliques only on occasion gain control of particular ''industries'' in a given area. One such clique, the authorities say, is a car theft ring that operates in the Deep South states. All together, however, Southern law officials say, the cliques have managed to gain control of the highly lucrative drug, pornography and prostitution activities that elsewhere have traditionally been operated by the mafia. Some Southerners who were onetime moonshiners have now turned to to the far more profitable drug trade, both growing the drug plants in mountain retreats and distributing the product through networks left from the illegal whisky trade, which largely died out by the 1970's as even the Bible Belt states went wet. By the same token, rural Southern thugs who at one time undertook nothing more complex than a smash-and-grab burglary or a service station holdup now take part in elaborate drug distribution networks, fraud, bribery of law-enforcement officials, money laundering and similar criminal activity. ''There is no question that now the so-called Dixie mafia is getting into more sophisticated criminal activity such as credit card and real estate fraud, drugs, pornography and prostitution,'' said Robert E. Stone, a Florida State's Attorney. ''It has not really gotten the stature of sophistication of the real mafia, but it is getting there.'' 7/26/85 Chicago Tribune: The Mafia-linked owner of a Northwest Side theater specializing in X- rated films was reported missing by his family Thursday as a federal commission completed two days of hearings in Chicago on pornography. Patrick Ricciardi, 59, owner of the Admiral Theater, 3936 W. Lawrence Ave., disappeared less than a month after a business acquaintance, Helen Lawrence, 38, a Chicago pornography dealer, was indicted by a federal grand jury investigating underworld infiltration of the pornography business. Ricciardi, cousin of the late crime syndicate enforcer Felix Alderisio, is suspected of helping the Mafia in the pornorgraphy business, sources said. On June 28 a grand jury in Cleveland indicted Lawrence, along with five others, on charges of conspiring to conceal profits from an international pornography distribution operation. Lawrence is listed in state records as president of Capitol News, a distributor of magazines; General Video Midwest, a distributor of videocassettes; and Midwest Bookkeeping Services, which provides accounting services to adult bookstores. Police said she also owns several adult bookstores. 10/20/85 Washington Post: The lone burglar or street-corner holdup man is virtually unknown in Japan. But police statistics show that at the end of 1984, there were 2,278 organized criminal gangs in existence, with 93,910 members. The Japanese feel best doing things in groups, and criminals are no exception. Their country's overall crime rates are tiny when compared to those in the United States. But yakuza manage to do a mammoth business, about $5 billion in 1981, according to police estimates, in such traditional preserves of organized crime as drug dealing, prostitution, extortion, bookmaking and pornography. 12/18/85 NY Times From a 1983 report by the New York City Police Department. Gambino Family Formerly headed by Paul Castellano Reputed to be the largest and most influential criminal organization in New York City. Suspected criminial activity: gambling, narcotics and loan sharking. Businesses: food, entertainment and jewelry. Active in union affairs. Owns many pizza parlors in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Active in Atlantic City. Size estimated at 250 members Genovese Family Headed by Anthony Salerno Reputed to be the second largest crime network in New York City. Suspected criminal activity: gambling, narcotics, loan sharking and extortion. Businesses: waterfront industries in Brooklyn and New Jersey, Times Square pornography establishments, labor unions and carting. Size estimated at 200 members Colombo Family Headed by Carmine Persico The head of the family is currently serving a prison term; in his absence, the operations are reportedly run by Jerry Langella. Suspected criminal activity: loan sharking, gambling, hijacking, criminal receiving, extortion, union racketeering, cigarette smuggling, pornography, bankruptcy frauds, counterfeiting and narcotics. Businesses: funeral homes, real estate agencies, wine and liquor distribution, catering, auto dealerships, trucking, vending franchises, restaurants, motion picture studio. Size estimated at 115 members Bonanno Family Headed by Philip Rastelli Suspected criminal activity: narcotics (reportedly one of the main sources of supply for New York City). Businesses: home video pornography, pizza parlors and Italian espresso cafes and restaurants. Size estimated at 195 members Lucchese Family Headed by Antonio Corallo Suspected criminal activities: narcotics, gambling and loan sharking. Businesses: construction, garment industry and trade waste removal. Size estimated at 110 members. 7/13/86 In early 1981, FBI wiretaps of Boston mob boss Jerry Angiulo gave a taste of the Mafia's control of the local porn industry. I quote from page 182 of the 1989 book "The Under Boss: The Rise and Fall of a Mafia Family": "He [Angiulo] was quick to defend Joseph Palladino of Saugus, who was a partner in several Worcester porn shops, when two wiseguys opened up a competing shop in that city with the blessing of New York's Gambino crimae family. Angiulo, livid at the intrusion into his turf, told Palladino that he would immediately intervene on his behalf." (AP) WASHINGTON - Joseph Palladino, an adult bookstore operator, was desperately looking for help because a competitor had gotten the blessing of Mafia bosses from New York to set up another porn shop nearby. Palladino got help in the form of a meeting in Boston with Gennaro J. Angiulo, the Mafia under-boss of organized crime in New England, says the Attorney General's Commission on Pornography. According to an account of the incident supplied in a letter from the FBI to the pornography commission in March, Palladino could not understand why organized crime interests in New York had authorized Carlo Mastrototaro, a business partner of Palladino, to compete with Palladino in Worcester, Mass. Though angry with Palladino for already having discussed his problem with another organized crime figure, Angiulo said he would talk to Genovese family captain Sam Cufari in an attempt to straighten things out. Angiulo has been convicted of racketeering and recently began serving a 45-year prison term. The Palladino-Angiulo meeting in 1981 illustrates what the pornography commission concludes are increasingly close ties between the $8 billion-a-year porn industry and traditional Mafia families across the United States. ``There seems (to be) strong evidence that significant portions of the pornographic magazine industry are either directly operated or closely controlled by La Cosa Nostra members or very close associates,'' the commission says. The commission's conclusions are hardly surprising, given the results of law enforcement investigations over the past decade tying in a number of organized crime figures with the production and distribution of pornography. Thomas Bohling of the Chicago Police Department told the commission that law enforcement officials believe that ``the pornography industry is controlled by organized crime families. If they do not own the business outright, they most certainly extract street tax from independent smut peddlers.'' The pornography commission's 2,000-page report issued Wednesday points to Reuben Sturman of Cleveland, ``widely believed to be the largest distributor of pornography in the world,'' as an example of the link between the Mafia and the porn industry. Mafia-figure-turned-informant Aladena Fratianno told the commission that if Sturman ``has a problem he goes to'' Robert DiBernardo. DiBernardo was identified in a federal grand jury indictment last month in New York as a captain in the Gambino family. Palladino, the adult bookstore operator worried about having a competitor, called DiBernardo his ``compare'' and had gone to him for help before seeing Angiulo, according to the FBI. Sturman and DiBernardo were ``partners, plus if Debe (DiBernardo) wanted (Sturman) to do something, he (Sturman) would do it,'' said Fratianno. DiBernardo was described to Fratianno as the ``main man in the country'' in the pornography business in the mid-1970s, when Fratianno was seeking ways to expand his own West Coast porn business. When Fratianno eventually met DiBernardo, DiBernardo told him that if Fratianno ``had wanted to get in the business he should have done it four or five years ago. Now it was all locked up,'' Fratianno told the pornography commission. 4/1/87 Washington Post: A firm with links to organized crime is among the suppliers of allegedly obscene videotapes to local video rental stores that were raided twice by federal agents in recent months, according to court documents and an FBI spokesman. The raids in October and March were in connection with a six-month-old investigation by an Alexandria federal grand jury into alleged violations of federal laws barring the interstate transport of obscene materials. The probe is focusing on some video outlets in Northern Virginia and Maryland, as well as on their out-of-state suppliers, several informed sources said. "We believe that there is organized crime involved," James Mull, a spokesman for the FBI office in Alexandria, said after the raids on March 11, when FBI and local police officials searched eight outlets of One Stop Video. "And because we do believe it, we're intensifying our effort in this [investigation]," Mull added. "They're looking for something that's not there; we're not controlled by organized crime," said John Kenny, who with his brother Leslie Todd Kenny owns One Stop Video. An affidavit filed in federal court in Alexandria by FBI special agent Jesse Loftin sets out reasons for the March 11 raids and asserts that the majority of allegedly obscene videos rented by One Stop Video and by Video Rental Center's outlets, which were raided in October, were bought from the New York-based Model Magazine Distributors Inc. Loftin's affidavit said that, according to a 1986 report by the New York State Senate Crime and Corruption Committee, Model "is one of the many business interest [sic] of Robert DiBernardo, a member of the New York Gambino family." DiBernardo has disappeared and is believed dead, his attorney Herald Price Fahringer said yesterday. Fahringer said he does not know if DiBernardo was a member of the Gambino family, which the government maintains is part of the Mafia organized crime network. DiBernardo was convicted of interstate transportation of obscene materials in Miami in 1981. That conviction is under review following disclosures that the testimony of an FBI agent was tainted, Fahringer said. Fahringer declined to say who now operates Model, which he is representing in the firm's challenge to a subpoena from the Alexandria grand jury. 5/30/87 A reputed West Coast Mafia leader from Canoga Park and six other men have been indicted on charges that they attempted to market $1 million worth of stolen municipal bonds, federal prosecutors announced Friday. Michael Anthony Rizzitello, 60, was named in a six-count federal indictment alleging that he conspired to sell public improvement bonds stolen from Manufacturers Hanover Trust in New York City in early 1983. Rizzitello was convicted in 1980 on charges growing out of attempts to take over Los Angeles' pornography and bookmaking trade, along with four other Southern California men identified as the upper echelon of the Los Angeles Mafia family. Also named in the current indictment is Leonard Aron, 60, owner of a popular Palm Springs restaurant, who is serving a seven-year federal prison sentence for his conviction in 1985 on charges of transporting stolen property. Also named in the indictment are Thomas Saullo Jr., 41, formerly of Nassau County, N.Y.; Steve Finkel, 40, formerly of Englewood, Colo.; Robert Zeichick, 50, of Woodland Hills; Jack Fineberg, 65, formerly of Los Angeles, and Jacob David Zemer, 40, of Tarzana. 6/29/87 LA Times Already, East Coast families, primarily the Gambino and Luchese organizations, hold firm sway over the Los Angeles pornography trade, the production source of an estimated 80% of the nation's pornography, a market worth nearly $1 billion a year locally that Southern California mobsters have been largely unable to tap. January 16, 1990 LA Times: Time magazine singled out [Michael Anthony] Rizzitello in September, 1977, as "rising quickly in influence and power" in the Los Angeles Cosa Nostra family. It credited him with helping the mob control most of the $100-million-a-year pornography business in the county. In 1978, Rizzitello and five other leaders of the Milano family were indicted in the biggest racketeering case in Los Angeles history. (One died before the trial). They were accused of using threats to muscle in on profits of pornographers in the county. One group of pornography dealers turned out to be undercover federal agents. Rizzitello was accused of trying to extort a million dollars from Moe Dalitz, a Las Vegas casino and hotel owner. Independent 10/5/91 Boss of Bosses neglects to mention, however, that systems of Mafioso patronage exist everywhere. People know they must aid each other, side with their friends, and with the friends of those friends, to fight some common enemy. John F Kennedy was said to have filled the White House with an Irish Mafia, the Murphia. And, in equally facetious usage, there is the Kosher Nostra for an alleged Jewish conspiracy, and the Taffia for a Welsh one. Nepotism, political favouritism, the pursuit of power and money seem all too human vices. 6/22/92 ROME (Reuter) - Italy's Mafia launders some of its profits from criminal activity in the booming Italian pornography industry, a market worth more than $1 billion a year, says a study published yesterday in local newspapers. The report by Rome's Social and Political Studies Institute estimates the annual sales for the industry - including home videos, porno shops, magazines and X-rated movie theatre - at no less than 1.5 trillion lire ($1.5 billion). It did not say how much could be attributed to Mafia activity. But the report claimed that organized crime has become involved in the industry "to recycle illegal profits from prostitution and in many cases from drugs. "Pornography has become a phenomenon which gives ample space to illegality, profiteering and violence, especially on minors," the report said. Total Mafia proceeds from all activities, including racketeering, drug trafficking, extortion and smuggling, is estimated at more than 150 trillion lire ($150 billion) a year. 9/13/92 St. Petersburg Times: Pasquale "Pat" Matassini is more than a convicted counterfeiter and owner of the nude dance club 2001: A Tampa Odyssey. To officials at Key Bank of Florida, he is also a good credit risk. Federal regulators were asking questions about some of Matassini's loans, but a pair of bank officials whose conversation was caught by a wiretap in June seemed confident Matassini would never welsh on his debts. "Pat Matassini sells pornography," Bill Mayes, bank vice president, said in a conversation with Lester Hirsch, an adviser to the bank's board of directors. "That's well-known, and he takes a lot of cash business in that he cannot report," Mayes said. "And I'll tell you another thing, too," Hirsch answered. "He has some sort of relationship with the bank, and if he ever loses it, where the f--- is he gonna get another one?" "He's gotta pay us," Mayes said. "Or he's not going to be able to operate." Investigators claim Matassini and 13 other men, most of them with strong ties to Key Bank, are "members of the Trafficante crime family." If the allegations prove true, the Key Bank case will have provided the first public glimpse of how the long-rumored, but little-known organization funds its criminal activities in the Tampa Bay area. 9/5/94 He charges the IRA bootlegs videos and compact discs, extorts protection money from construction sites, imports and sells an illegal cattle growth hormone, uses strong-arm tactics to control a string of pubs around Dublin and is involved in pornography. Ruairi O'Bradaigh, former IRA chief of staff, calls reports that the IRA was dealing in pornography "absolute slander." Kevin Beechum, Russell Hampshire's Role In Reuben Sturman Bombing Affair From http://www.kentlaw.edu/7circuit/1995/94-2527.html ARGUED JANUARY 4, 1995--DECIDED MARCH 14, 1995 Before BAUER, and MANION, Circuit Judges, and MILLER, District Judge. Reuben Sturman was convicted of conspiracy to commit extortion, attempted extortion, and travel in interstate commerce for the purposes of com- mitting extortion. 18 U.S.C. secs. 1951, 1952. He contends on appeal that the trial court proceeding was fraught with error and asks, on that basis, that we reverse his con- viction or at least vacate portions of his sentence. We find his arguments unpersuasive, and so we affirm. I. From his home state of California, Reuben Sturman operated a nationwide wholesale and retail adult entertainment business for over thirty years. His power and influence was such that many in the industry believed that he was the industry. Sturman had substantial control over distribution of adult videos and magazines and marital aids. A significant portion of his income came from small operators located throughout the United States, who paid Sturman for supplies or services in organizing and run- ning local enterprises. Sturman's fiery relationship with operators in Phoenix, Cleveland, and Chicago led to the prosecution of this case. Tamara Green took over the ownership and operation of the Book Cellar, a chain of several adult book stores in Phoenix, Arizona, after her husband, Howard, the store's previous owner, passed away in 1990. The Book Cellar leased peep show video equipment from Sturman. Soon after taking over the business, Green learned that, for several months, her husband had been paying Sturman twice the amount called for in the lease agreement. Green instructed her accountant to suspend all payments until October of 1991 when the accumulated credit would be exhausted and at which point they could resume payment at the contract rate. Sturman was not particularly pleased with Green's decision. On several occasions in the fall of 1991, Sturman told Green's accountant and general manager that unless Green paid him the additional money, he would "send her a message." In November of 1991, Herbert Feinberg, an employee of Sturman's, asked Kevin Beechum to hire some people "to smash a bookstore in Phoenix, Arizona." Beechum hired Jay Brisette, Donald Mares, and Paul Mahn and instructed them to vandalize one of Green's stores because she wasn't paying the money which she owed. On December 21, 1991, Brisette, Mares, and Mahn entered Green's store with hammers and baseball bats and pro- ceeded to cause approximately $10,000 in property dam- age. Convinced that this was Sturman's "message," Green resumed paying Sturman at a monthly rate twice that of the agreement. Sturman's secretary testified that when she asked Sturman why Green had resumed paying the higher rate, he replied, "I sent her a message and she understood." Mel Kamins had been associated with Sturman since 1955. In 1986, Kamins purchased several Cleveland adult entertainment businesses from Sturman. His agreement with Sturman required Kamins to make monthly payments ranging between $60,000 and $90,000 for ten years to Sturman or Sturman's nominees. In the meantime, the IRS had discovered that Sturman was significantly delinquent on his prior tax obligations. Consequently, the IRS served upon Kamins and others owing obligations to Sturman, tax levies directing those persons to pay directly to the IRS any money owed to Sturman. After Kamins began complying with the levy, Sturman contacted Kamins in an effort to persuade him to ignore the levy and continue the payments. Alternatively, Sturman urged Kamins to skim his profits and pay Sturman in cash. Kamins refused. Sturman proceeded to hire a man named James Long to investigate the level of security at Kamins's stores. Long had performed security-oriented work for Sturman in the past. Sturman told Long that Kamins had not been paying Sturman what he owed. Later that month (February 1992), Sturman and Long visited Kamins's store. When Kamins again insisted on honoring the IRS levy, Sturman wrote Kamins a note which read, "You are going to get a message." Though nothing ever was done to Kamins or his business, Feinberg did discuss with Kevin Beechum the possibility of hiring Beechum's men to do a few more jobs in Cleveland. It appears as if the only thing that saved Kamins from a fate similar to that of Green were the developments taking place in Chicago. Roy May and his wife, Paula, owned and operated several adult entertainment businesses in Chicago. They had an arrangement with Sturman that entitled Sturman to a certain percentage of the profits received from their peep show receipts. Under this arrangement, the Mays typically delivered to one of Sturman's nominees a cash payment ranging from $60,000 to $100,000 every four to six weeks. This portion of the Mays' revenues was never reported to the IRS. Sturman frequently demanded that in addition to the payments, the Mays give him title to half of their real estate holdings, the purchase of which Sturman had absolutely nothing to do with. Understandably, the Mays refused these demands. In 1987, Paula May was indicted for tax evasion. Subsequently, Roy May ceased making the payments to Sturman. Sturman then suggested that May pay Sturman the money through a consulting arrangement. Although he received no benefit from this arrangement, May consented to the deal for fear that if he did not, Sturman would ruin him financially. During the term of the consulting contract, May resumed his profit-skimming cash payments to Sturman, albeit at a lower rate. In 1988, Roy May refused to renew the consulting con- tract. Again, however, his fear of what Sturman might do to him and his business caused him to agree to pay Sturman $3.7 million for the rights to show adult films produced by Sturman's new company, Wild Man Films Inc., despite knowing that these films were worth no more than $200,000. May never used these films. When the IRS began sending tax levies to Sturman's various debtors, Sturman suggested that he and May cancel their Wild Man Films contract so that May would have nothing to pay to the IRS. They did so but soon thereafter, Sturman began pressuring May to resume paying him. Sturman asked May to start making payments to a company named Video Views, which Sturman insisted could not be traced to Sturman. Reluctant to violate the IRS levy, May refused. In the spring of 1992, Feinberg once again hired Brisette and his men, this time for a job in Chicago. After the financial arrangements were completed, Brisette and three others, Donald Mares, Paul Mahn, and Joseph Martinez, flew to Chicago. They intended to plant several remote- controlled bombs at eight of May's Chicago stores. After successfully planting a bomb at the first site, Mares and Mahn were travelling to a store on Wells Street when one of their bombs detonated in their car at the intersection of Dearborn and Division streets. Mahn fled the scene. Mares died as a result of injuries sustained in the explosion. After hearing about the explosion, Brisette and Martinez aborted their efforts and together with Mahn, returned to Los Angeles. From there, the plan continued to unravel. Still panicked from what had happened in Chicago, Brisette began to cooperate with the FBI. As part of his co- operation, Brisette participated in a tape-recorded conversation with Feinberg. The FBI then approached Feinberg and asked him to cooperate in a case against Sturman. Feinberg refused and then went to meet with Russell Hampshire, another figure in the California adult entertainment industry and a friend of Sturman's. In his conversation with Hampshire, Feinberg stated that he had been hired by Sturman to damage some stores in Chicago and that one of the people involved was killed. Feinberg asked Hampshire to assure Sturman that Feinberg would not cooperate with the police as long as Sturman helped him with his legal fees. When Hampshire passed on Feinberg's message, Sturman told Hampshire that he would take care of Feinberg's legal fees. A few months later, Sturman transferred $25,000 from his account to an account held by Feinberg's attorney. Sturman and Feinberg were indicted together but tried separately. Sturman was convicted on Counts One, Seven, and Eight of a ten-count indictment. Count One charged Sturman and Feinberg with conspiring to commit extortion with respect to Green, Kamins, and the Mays. 18 U.S.C. sec. 1951. Count Seven charged Sturman and Feinberg with an attempt to commit extortion in connection with their threats to the Mays between November of 1991 and November 1992. Id. Count Eight charged Sturman and Feinberg with causing persons to travel in interstate commerce for the purpose of promoting extortion. 18 U.S.C. sec. 1952. Sturman was acquitted of the remaining charges. The court sentenced Sturman to 235 months in prison and imposed a two-year term of supervised release. Sturman appeals his conviction and his sentence. January 28, 1997 Financial Times of London: Once one of Europe's safest cities, Budapest is being rocked by a spate of gangland bombings and shootings. More than a dozen such incidents in as many weeks culminated in an anti-tank mortar attack on a nightclub on New Year's Eve, and there have been more grenade explosions since. Police say the attacks are part of a power struggle between organised criminals whose rise has been one of the worst by-products of Hungary's transition to capitalism. One of those killed before Christmas was a well-known pimp, active in a flourishing sex industry that ranges from producing pornography through to trafficking and selling women and children for sexual exploitation. "There's a new fight going on between the Ukrainian and Hungarian mafias," says Ms Zsuzsa Kadar, a trade union official active on women's issues. "It used to be that the Ukrainian pimps controlled the bar, disco and hotel prostitutes and left the Hungarian pimps with the streets. Now, the Ukrainians want a bigger share." Prostitution is nothing new for Hungary but it has exploded, like the rest of the sex industry, since the collapse of communism. Ms Kadar draws parallels between Budapest and Bangkok, Asia's sex capital. She says there are some 60,000 prostitutes: from those who discreetly target smart city-centre hotels to the barely-dressed women who parade, day and night, along the streets of the city's 8th district - to the fury of local residents and the parents whose children must walk past them on their way to school. Thousands more work as dancers and hostesses in bars and nightclubs or in pornography. It is estimated that between 100 and 120 feature-length pornographic films are made in Hungary each year, mainly for western European markets - something which is tolerated because of the large sums of money involved. This has helped keep alive the country's once important film industry, which has been hit badly by the post-Communist recession. Much of the pornography is made by foreigners, who, to the concern of the police, are increasingly active in the local sex industry. The growing involvement of international criminal groups, according to police and activists, is a significant factor behind the upswing in migrant women and children working in the industry. "Hungary is both a source [for the sex industry], a point of transit and a destination," says Ms Antonia Burrows, a British university lecturer who has been active in women's groups since moving to Hungary in 1988. "The Budapest-Vienna axis is now the most important east-west route and Budapest is where the deals are made." The interior ministry estimates about a third of prostitutes in Budapest are immigrants, many of them from neighbouring Ukraine and Romania. Like many Hungarian prostitutes, some end up further west - in Austria, Belgium or the Netherlands. Police in Vienna estimate that two thirds or more of prostitutes working there are foreign. Many are driven to prostitution by the widespread poverty and mass unemployment caused by the transition from communism. Others are tricked into the sex industry after answering innocent sounding advertisements offering good salaries in the west for au pairs or waitresses. 12/31/98 Boston Globe 12/31/98 When Anthony Russo, president of Jay Kays, was asked at the hearing about his past businesses, he listed a number of Boston bookstores, but did not mention United Books, according to the licensing decision. Russo was a business associate in United Books with Carlo Mastrototaro, the alleged head of organized crime for Central Massachusetts, the decision said. Russo also had been charged with distributing obscene matter, but did not mention the case on his application for the strip club. The investigators then did some legwork they might have skipped back when Russo and Jay Kays first got their entertainment license for Liberty Book II. They turned up a Globe Spotlight series from 1983 that detailed the mob links of Combat Zone businesses. Russo was linked to Mastrototaro in the articles. Other records showed that Joe P. Enterprises, headed by Joseph Palladino , was in the same building on Washington Street as the proposed strip club. Palladino, according to records, was a part owner of the Washington Street building and a principal in Jay Kays. Palladino's past convictions for income tax evasion and trafficking in pornography were not mentioned on the application for the strip club, a point that the city noted in denying the license. "It's not like it's rocket science," Lo added, pointing to the ease with which Russo's and Palladino's criminal records and business ties were detailed in electronic databases and government documents. Palladino had pleaded guilty to evading $29,000 in taxes in 1970. He also was linked in FBI reports and an organized crime chart in the Suffolk district attorney's office as having close links to former mob underboss Gennaro Angiulo. The Animal In Hollywood Here are a few excerpts from the 1998 book The Animal in Hollywood, about mob enforcer Anthony Fiato, by John L. Smith. Pg. 124-125 "...Jimmy Coppola, the guy who picked up the cash. He was later stabbed and killed in prison. And all this came about because Harvey Ross [Harvey Rosenthal, longtime employee of VCA, video pirate, duper, died of cancer about 1995] got me [Fiato] to pressure Marty Krause [Los Angeles crime figure], who in turn went to Mike Esposito [longtime pornographer, owner of Gentleman's Video], who went over to his father Sal [who worked with the Anthony 'Tony Ducks' Corrallo crew out of Harlem, part of the NY based Lucchesse crime family] and then went to Walter [Stevens, veteran LA crime figure]. "Sal tried all kinds of things to get us to lay off. He called me up one day and said, 'Butchie Peraino says to say hello.' And then he asks, 'Is this coming from Mike [Rizzitello, veteran LA crime boss]?' Because if it is, they know where to go to get it stopped. I [Fiato] said, 'This is coming from me.' I know Butchie is with the Genovese people [NY Mafia family], but he's nothing to me. They were all in the porno business together. The Perainos had that Deep Throat movie. I told Sal, 'Well, say hello to Butchie for me and tell him to stay the hell out of my business.' "But two years earlier I had had guys pressuring the Espositos. That was what set up the Red Morgan move. They threatened to go to everybody they knew. Sal Amarena, Jimmy Fratianno's old friend from San Francisco... "In the middle of it, I back down... So when I figured they'd dropped their guard, I sent Fat Steve Munichiello and Carl Cataldo over to Mike Esposito's office. And they give him the beating of his life." Former porn journalist (1978-88) Hart Williams writes: So what's your point, Luke? Is porn in the business of selling heroin because a couple of junkies are in the biz? As usual, you would prefer to prove a pre-existing prejudice, rather than assay a field of information and come to a reasonable conclusion. I remember Sal and Mike shooting a Seka video a long time ago, and everyone on the set knew they had shadowy mob connections. Why was this interesting? A: Because of its very uniqueness. Many had never seen such athing in years in the biz. If mob connections were rife, nobodywould have given it a second thought. Instead, it was THE buzz for days. B: Because no one on the set had any real knowledge of the "Mob"that the Espositos were rumored to be connected with (and, moreimportantly, DIDN'T WANT TO KNOW MORE). This was my first clue that the connection between porn and XXX was a lot more tenuous than was assumed as gospel by biased custardheads out in general society. C: As usual, the connections are precisely what I said they were:money connections outside the experience of working porn people.Whether a movie is shot with Union Retirement Funds, with Senator Graham's campaign contributions, or with Mob Money, the effect is merely to rent the equipment, and neither Union Organizers, Senate Aides nor Mobsters are ever seen by the actual porn workers. Source Confirms That Russell Hampshire Sought To Put A Hit On His Former Partner Walter Gernert 5/21/01 Last week I spoke to a person with strong connections to both porn and the Mafia who said that he'd heard the audiotape from around 1981 where VCA owner Russell Hampshire can be heard asking for a Mafia murder of his business partner of the time Walter Gernert. My reliable source says that the tape remains firmly in the possession of former Mafia muscleman Anthony Fiato, who in 1998 published his autobiography "The Animal In Hollywood: Anthony Fiato's Life in the Mafia." We may soon have audio excerpts of Hampshire's request to play on the internet. Hampshire totally denies the story. I know of no other media source within the porn industry that has run this story though I know various porn journalists who are well aware it. Including Paul Fishbein, publisher of Adult Video News, who outright lies to the news media repeatedly about the role of the Mafia in the industry. Frank Rich writes Sunday for the NYTimes.com: "I ask if organized crime is a factor in today's porn world. "When I got here, I heard there were mob companies," he [Fishbein] answers. "But I've never even been approached by a criminal element. I've never been threatened or bribed. So if it ever existed, it's part of the history of the business." He almost sounds disappointed." Luke says: Paul Fishbein knows about Metro Home Video. In January 1997, as Paul Fishbein very well knows (because he assigned Mark Kernes to write a story about it), Metro pled guilty to working with the Gambino crime family. Fishbein knows very well about porn's numerous ties to the Mob but he keeps quiet about it, and lies about it, because to admit such truths would be bad for business. Fishbein told Sundays New York Times magazine: "Porn doesn't have a demographic -- it goes across all demographics," says Paul Fishbein, 42, the compact and intense man who founded Adult Video News. "There were 11,000 adult titles last year versus 400 releases in Hollywood." Luke says: This is nonsense. Porn does have a demographic - men particularly single secular men. Porn sells much better in Democratic areas and states than Republican ones.And out of these supposed 11000 new titles last year, no more than 2000 were new movies. Most "new titles" are just old footage rereleased as compilations. Fishbein knows very well that porn has a demographic but again, to admit such truth would be bad for business. I quote from page 134 of the book "Animal" published 1998 by Barricade Books, New York.Mafia enforcer Anthony Fiato says: "After I bailed out Harvey Ross [aka Harvey Rosenthal, long time employee of Russ Hampshire who died of cancer in 1994, thief, assisted in the 1982 murder of actor Frank Christi with pornographers and dupers Alan Betts and Ronald Coe who are associates of Robert Zeichick aka Puggy, criminal, thief, pornographer], he started coming to the club regularly and told me all about the pornographers he knew. Now Harvey's acting like one of my crew… He tells me he's working for a place called the American Video Library for Russ Hampshire, who Harvey says wants to have somebody killed. Russ realized who I [LA mafia enforcer Anthony Fiato] was and knew me by reputation, and he's also good friends with Michael Esposito. Russ knew that Harvey [Rosenthal] was friendly with me, and he [Russ Hampshire] brought up this deal to Harvey that his partner, Walter [Gernert], was throwing away the business by doing so much cocaine. Harvey came back and told me that Russ had told him he wanted to have his partner [Walter Gernert] killed. "So I send Harvey to Radio Shack for a seventy-eight-dollar pocket recorder and arrange a meeting with Russ. I told Harvey, 'Get him [Hampshire] alone again and get him to repeat what he'd said. Harvey goes to the meeting, follows him into the men's room, and asks him if he was really sure he wanted to go through with this. Harvey gets him to say he wants his motherf---ing partner dead and is willing to pay Anthony fifty-thousand to do the job. Half up front and half when it's done. We take the half up front. "After Harvey met with him, we made another meet, this time at the Tail O' Pop on La Cienega [Blvd]. Harvey, Puggy, John Di Mittia and I were at the meeting. When Russ walked in I could see the fear on his face. He only expected to be meeting me [Fiato] and Harvey [Rosenthal]. Russ was carrying a briefcase and sat down. He appeared to know everybody at the table. I told Harvey to take out the tape and play it for him. "Russ's eyes almost popped out of his head like a frog. I gave him the tape. I said, 'Here, you're lucky this came to my attention because this motherf---er Harvey was going to blackmail you.' He was so happy, he slid the briefcase over in the booth and handed over twenty-five thousand cash, just like that. We're not going to kill anybody for this guy. And we don't have to. He can't go to the cops. He can't do anything. It was sweet. "When he [Hampshire] left, we just laughed. I'd had Harvey make six copies of that f---ing tape. Russ kept paying for two years until finally after the fifth or sixth time he turned his pockets inside out and said, 'All I've got left is lint. Tell Walter, tell the cops. Tell anybody you want. I don't care what you do.' "At that point we'd taken thousands from the guy and we didn't need to hurt anyone." Luke found this story 12/24/98 and immediately phoned Russ at home. Russ completely denied it but asked me to keep off my site. I said would hold running it. I needed to investigate it more. When I relayed this story toWalter Gernert at the January 1999 CES he appeared genuinely shocked and said had not heard of it. At that time we were having an intense heart-to-heart conversation in Russ Hampshire's office inside the VCA booth. Russ stood outside the office looking through the window to make sure nothing bad happened to me. 5/18/01 New Books Establish Link Between Porn And The Mob Jordan writes: Anthony Fiato is doing a new book now. The publishers left out so much in the first book the Animal in Hollywood. Also the Animal will be out soon in paperback, with more chapters and pictures. The other will be Called Mobsters, Pornstars and Federal Agents and that is being written as we speak. It will have a lot on porn, Strip clubs (Skim). How the whole Porn Call girl thing works. The deals companies use like providing sex and kickbacks to secure cable deals. The big porn-a-thon run by Big Jerry Zimmerman (Colombo Family con man) and John Stallion [John Laolagi] (I saw him with Joe Isgro). This made Mark Curtis [Mark Carriere] a lot of $$$. There will be more on Caci soon in the Las Vegas papers and I am sure porn will be in it! When Jimmy Caci Shook Down David Sturman 5/18/01 XXX (a pornographer who prefers to remain anonymous) says: You know who sent Jimmy Caci (West Coast mobster whose contacts go up to Sonny Franzese of the Colombo crime family) to Sin City to shake down David Sturman in 1995? It was Ken Gallo, aka Kenji, that Japanese guy who thinks he's a mobster. You can see Jimmy Caci and Ken Gallo and Tabitha Stevens in this picture. Gallo claimed that Sin City owed him money. I think they screwed David over which is why David was being a hardass. They got into a screaming match. There were a lot of people in the building when it happened. Kenny called these people (Jimmy Caci and company) in from Palm Springs. David got into an argument with them. David told they to go f--- themselves. And they said they were going to make a phone call. David said, 'You're going to make a f---ing phone call? I'll make a f---ing phone call. I'll make your f---ing phone call s--- in your pants.' In other words, David can make a bigger phone call. And those guys left. Luke: They left with thousands of David's dollars. XXX: They left with way less money than was owed Kenny. I know they settled for less, for like $9,000 out of $15,000. David was ballistic. He was pissed beyond belief. He was screaming. 'You bring these f---ing wiseguys into my f---ing place?' And then David tried to blackball Kenny Gallo. He said that GVA would not buy anything that had Kenny Gallo's name on it. I'm sure he still won't talk to Kenny Gallo. YYY (another pornographer who prefers to remain anonymous) says: This Israeli guy Ben, through Jerry Zimmerman, sold a movie to Mickey Blank at Sin City. And Sin City never bothered to pay. So Jimmy Caci went down there and collected the money from David Sturman. Later, Sin City owed money to Kenny Gallo for the Buck Adams movie Blade. The video rights were sold to Kevin Beechum and David Sturman bought the foreign and cable rights. David claimed that Buck owned the money and that he didn't owe Kenji any money. So Kenji showed him the copyright on the movie. So Kenji and Jimmy Caci and a couple of other guys went into Sin City to pay David Sturman a call. And Buck Adams and Mickey Blank and a bunch of guys were there. Buck got thrown out. And David said, 'I don't know what you guys are making such a big deal about. It's only $13,000.' An argument erupted. David tried to weasel his way out and that he knew people, muscle, too. So Jimmy says, 'Get on the phone bubblegum chewing motherf---er. Call who you've got to call.' And of course, David didn't call anyone because he can't. He has no muscle. Just because you have money doesn't mean anything. Then Mickey Blank interjected until he got told to shut up. And Gallo got his check. Jimmy Caci made hundreds of thousands of dollars off of porno. But he and the other mobsters hate to be called pimps. But they take the money. They shake people down and they're silent partners with pornographers. Jimmy Caci was good friends with Butchie and Tony Peraino and LP Duplication and "Big Chris" Natale Richichi (a captain in the Gambino family). Big Chris's son Sal owned L.A. Video with Kevin Beechum. Big Chris lived in Las Vegas. He just died. Big Chris got arrested in Las Vegas with Kenny Guarino (owner of Metro) and Fat Stevie (Stephen Cino), an LA mob soldier from Buffalo, for trying to bribe a union official. Big Chris extorted money from Kenny Guarino to allow Kenny to operate in New England. Fat Stevie got 15 years for the murder of Herbert "Fat Herbie" Blitzstein, a Chicago mob associate. Mike Calados (sp?) is dead now. He owned a big porno place by Julian Benadi (sp?) near the old Western Visuals building. Mike did lots of bondage. When Reuben Sturman fled, Mike and those guys helped him flee and helped hide him. Mike was good friends with Paulie Vario, who Henry Hill put away. Mike kept a picture of Paulie on his desk. Bruce Peraino got cancer and died. Butch's dad's brother, Joseph 'The Whale' Peraino, hated Butchie and the Perainos. Joseph is paralyzed. LP Duplication was owned by Butchie's son Patsy. Butchie's other son got killed in jail because he had a big mouth and was on drugs. Tommy Sinopoli used to hang out with Rubin Gottesman and his son-in-law Jimmy Marzullo. But they lost everything. Jimmy got beat up by Frank Barbarino's guy Ryan and Bogie. Frank Barbarino owns the printing place FB with Kevin Beechum. He does boxcovers for everybody. Barbarino hangs out with a captain in the LA family named Lou Caruso. They work out all the time at that gym off DeSoto called Power House. Kevin Beechum supplied the bikers for Reuben to go after those porners in Chicago. The reason that Kevin ratted everyone out was not just that the bomb blew up accidentally and killed one of the bikers, but that the car they were driving was rented on Kevin's credit card. Kevin Beechum used to send the bikers money back. One of the guys is still in prison. Kevin takes care of all of them. Kevin likes to keep guys like that around. Some mobster friends of Peter North were arrested for stealing $20 million dollars from the investment group DLJ Italian in Irvine, CA. It was a scam. They used Peter North to sucker people. T.T. Boy's uncle lost $200,000 in it. In the year 2000, Mickey Blank tried to get Gallo arrested for selling his product. First Blank told the police that it was counterfeit. The Orange County intelligence squad drove all the way into the San Fernando Valley to look into this. Mickey claimed that the only person who could distribute his product was him. And that it was worth $14 a tape. But everyone in the business knows it is worth $2 a tape. It turned out that Mickey Blank's son sold the 400 pieces to Kenji Gallo. And Mickey and the police looked like idiots. Kenji was married to Tabetha Stevens. Amber Lynn got high on crack cocaine and held Kenji Gallo hostage. The SWAT team got the gun away from her. She ran. They grabbed her. They held her on $30,000 bail. She called and threatened Kenji 20-30 times in a day and they pressed charges against her for making telephonic threats. And placed a six-year restraining order against her. Director Frank Marino went out with Amber. Frank told Amber that his dad was connected and a made guy. His dad is a horn player in a band in Las Vegas. So Los Angeles mobster Bobby Milano called Frank Sr in Las Vegas and told him to get Frank to cool it. You can have friends in Cosa Nostra but unless you get arrested for RICO [racketeering] or murder or conspiracy, you're nothing. You're not a mobster. You're a wanna be. Guys that have a business and know a few guys - yeah, you can pay them and they might do something for you. Or they might just take your money. If it becomes too hard, they will abandon you. You're only as good as the last dollar you can give someone. David Sturman has no muscle behind him. And the short jail time he did at that cushy Arizona prison was real hard on him. David Sturman, Russell Hampshire and Mark Carriere all have the same problem - there's nothing else they can do where they can make the same amount of money. And they are too big for anyone to buy them out. And you can't trust anyone else to run it for you. These guys would've gotten out years ago if they could. Many porn girls have gone to Brunei and earned hundreds of thousands of dollars. And they've spent it all. Various porn girls are getting ready to go again. Caressa Savage would send girls out. Bruce Willis would pay J.R. Carrington to fly from Orange County to Las Vegas to service him. The most connected guy in the porn business now is probably former VCR salesman Joseph Abinanti whose "godfather," according to law enforcement ranks near the top of the Luccheses. Abinanti was good friends with Martin Tacetta and Peter Vario, the son of Paul Vario. Peter ran the hijacking at Kennedy airport until recently. The FBI is most interested in Peter. Joseph Abinanti runs a duplication shop (located by the old Western Visuals) and with a guy named Trez they loanshark out money for 3-5% a week. They also offer bookmaking. Abinanti is good friends with Lenny Montana Jr, whose father Lenny Montana Sr played Luca Brazi in the Godfather. Lenny Sr was a real hood. Lenny Jr has become a real hood. He was head of security at the House of Blues. Then he was in Las Vegas until they kicked him out. Lenny owns some restaurants. He partnered with Joey Merlino aka Skinny Joey (the boss of the Philadelphia-South Jersey mob in 1998). They loaned out money to Russell Hampshire's best friend Javier, his step-son (the son of Russ's wife before Betty who now works as a secretary for Michael Esposito). Javier owned the porn production company Mystic. And Javier f---ed Russell and people wanted to hurt Javier. And some people stepped in and they ended up selling the company to Michael Esposito and Tony Spasado (sp?). Tony was a huge drug dealer who just got out of prison after ten years. Mystic Productions is based at 6603 Independance Avenue #G in Canoga Park, CA, 91303. MysticHardcore.com. Mystic is not a big company but it makes enough money to allow Michael Esposito to buy a $400,000 new house. Big Tony, a volatile Italian, used to own a restaurant in Tolucca Lake called The Money Tree. He bought it for $900,000 though on paper he only paid $100,000. Movie stars and organized crime guys used to go there. The bar has been part of the LA mob scene forever. In 1948, Jimmy Caci and Sonny machine gunned the back of the bar and the bullet holes are still there. Big Tony was a big drug dealer with a guy called Ronnie Rome and Uncle Mike who owns a Italian restaurant on DeSoto Ave and Victory by the 7-11. Big Tony likes to reminisce with fellow connected porners about the old days and why John Gotti killed Robert DiBernardo. Joseph Abinanti is good friends with Vinnie "The Duplicator" DeStefano, who does porn duplication. Vinnie and Michael Esposito were close to LA mobster Mike Rizzitello. Abinanti is known to his friends as low key "Joey The Duplicator," who runs a small duplicating business. "If Joey's the Mob's big guy in porno Luke, why does he call people up looking for their work?" asked a porner. "Joey's a hard working great guy who duplicates videos." These guys, Joseph Abinanti, Michael Esposito, Big Tony, and Chuck Zane, Lenny Friedlander, play cards with Los Angeles Mob boss Pete Milano. They all play golf together too. Chuck Zane was close to Rinny The Plumber, the mob boss of Rochester, New York. Rinny got two 20-year sentences in a row. Rinny's son is the new boss. Chuck Zane's brother Dominic Zicari, father of Rob Black, foots the bills for Extreme. An Italian girl named Mary, who claimed to be Sonny Franzese's niece, had stuff on Lenny Friedlander and would shake him down for money. She'd get checks for $5-10,000 from Lenny. When Sonny heard, he sent someone to have a talk with her. Sonny knew her dad well. He was killed. Sonny felt bad. So he looked out for her. A guy named Maurice Spado used to always extort money from Lenny Friedlander. But around 1995, Pete Milano put out the word to not extort Lenny anymore. Which probably means that Milano was squeezing him. Whenever Milano puts out the word that a certain bookmaker could not be squeezed anymore, it means that Milano was squeezing him. Brian Berber runs New Sensations. The company is owned by Scott Taylor who also owns National - a big one stop distributor. Brian Berber backed Eli's company All Good Video. But Eli, a Jew from South Philadelphia, started partying too much and getting f---ed up, so Brian got out of it and sold the company to Odyssey. Eli has a big mouth and alienates people. Tina Marie's brother John Stallion organized the big Pornathon in 1989 for Mark Carriere. They shot about 60 porn movies in 30 days and all the talent got bad checks. It was organized by John, and Ben Silver the Israeli and Jerry Zimmerman. All the organizers got new cars. Carriere got all the masters and all the model releases and none of the talent got paid a dime. Jerry Zimmerman was a tremendous con man, close to Sonny Franzese and his Sonny's son Michael. Michael stole $300 million. They made a breakdancing movie "Knights of the City," starring Sammy Davis Jr and Janet Jackson. And they made another movie starring Linda Blair. Then Jerry Zimmerman and John Stallion brought the Russian circus over. And it ran out of money in Missouri because Jerry and John stole all the money. The animals were starving. It was on 60 Minutes. They had to feed these Russian people and send them home. The circus had been around 100 years and they bankrupted it in two months. Tina Marie was beautiful but she ruined herself with drugs and alcohol. Most of these girls do, like Amber Lynn. Amber used to have $500,000 in the bank. Now she has nothing. YYY: Russ Hampshire tapes his meeting in his office now Jerry Zimmerman was Sonny Franzese's man in Las Vegas for years. Now
dead. John says: A&E had a two hour report on OJ Simpson last night. You know when they were chasing O.J. down the freeway? They used more cops to go to Jeff Steward's house than to capture O.J.. There was a big article on how the LAPD had to cancell a couple of big programs like detective training because they don't have enough uniforms to put on the street. Because they're losing 26 officers a month and they're not hiring anybody. But they're way short of officers though they can send 40 officers to Jeff Mike's house. Los Angeles makes a ton of money off of porno, such as through permits. The permit office knows who the porno guys are. And they put a special thing on the porno permit which says that you can't have any visible or audible signs of sexual activity. You think they put that on Warner Brothers permit? They know who we are when we go in there. They whoo us. I think the entire porn industry should endorse Jim Hahn for mayor to guarantee he loses. Isn't Hahn the District Attorney? I don't know how many times vice and police officers have come on my set. If I'm engaged in illegal activities, when they come to the set, why don't they arrest anybody? XXX says: Money launderers would prefer to go to people like Eli from All Good Video. He can start a company from nowhere. Well, he started All Good with money from Bruce Berber, who runs New Sensations. THE ARIZONA REPUBLIC July 6, 1999: The world's organized criminals have a greater economic output than all but three of the world's national economies, according to a United Nations report, and the biggest growth area is drugs. The U.N.'s 1999 Human Development Report estimates organized crime syndicates gross around $1.6 trillion a year. By comparison, the United Kingdom's economic output is just over $1.28 trillion. The biggest growth area is drugs, which are now a bigger global industry than motor manufacturing. Over the past 10 years, the production of opium has more than tripled and the production of coca leaves has doubled. The illegal drug trade - supplying 200 million customers - is worth around $400 billion, or 8 percent of world trade. Another growth industry is trafficking in women and girls for the sex industry - a business worth $8 billion a year. Most of the main criminal groups have extended beyond their home territories. The Chinese triads are in the restaurant trade in London, the Sicilian Mafia is selling heroin in New York, and the Japanese yakuza are financing pornography in the Netherlands. According to the 1999 book by Martin Booth, "The Dragon Syndicates," organized crime, particularly through the auspices of Hong Kong's Triads gang, dominates the sex trade in Asia: Triad societies have, of course, long been associated with vice. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century they operated sing-song houses and brothels in all the major Chinese cities, as well as overseas, although it was in Shanghai and, even more so, in Hong Kong that their most famous establishments existed. Today Triad-controlled vice splits into two main categories: the running of brothels or prostitutes, and the production and retailing of pornography. (p. 227) ...The myth that all Oriental women are sex goddesses is, of course, bunkum. Many of those trapped into vice are taught their trade by their Triad controllers, who 'break them in' like docile mustangs. Gang rape is a common means of subduing and establishing ownership over a prostitute, some of whom are also used for sex by Triad members or 'boyfriends'. The better-loooking girls star in pornographic movies. (p. 232) Alongside prostitution, the Triads have also had a virtual monopoly over pornography in South-east Asia since the early 1950s. They started with the publication of pornographic books, then graduated to 8 mm cine' film and, as technology changed, to videotape. Initially, sex films were made using 49s and Triad prostitutes as cast, but in time they took to employing backpackers travelling the world, foreign servicemen who were willing to star in sex movies and local teenagers looking to make a bit of money. With Hong Kong's position as a world leader in electronics and plastics manufacturing, it is not surprising that the Triads have also cornered the market in sex-toy production. Dildoes, vibrators, inflatable sex dolls, fetishist equipment and Spanish Fly-type drugs are made in abundance... (p. 233)
Japanese Mafia's Role In Porno Far Eastern Economic Review, Nov 30, 2000: IN AN INCIDENT that is rapidly acquiring the status of legend in the Japanese underworld, a gangster walks into a porn shop in Tokyo in August 1999 and asks who gets paid for "protection." The manager places a business card emblazoned with the mark of another gang on the counter. The thug burns a hole through the card with his cigarette, and puts his own card on top of it. Your protection agency just changed, he tells the manager. I'll drop by to pick up your dues later, he adds. The gangster came from the Kobe-based Yamaguchi Gumi, and slowly, but steadily, he and his comrades have been muscling in on rival territory, creating a force that now dominates organized crime in Japan. "The Yamaguchi Gumi talks about maintaining peace between gangs and abiding by the principles of kyozon kyoei," or coexistence and coprosperity, says a major Tokyo underworld figure. "But once you give it a small slice of the action suddenly it's taken it all." According to police statistics, it boasted 16,500 full-time members in 1999, up a third since Watanabe took over 12 years ago, and more than five times the size of the entire American Mafia at its peak in the 1950s. All told, as many as 38,000 gangsters -- or nearly one in two professional Japanese criminals -- report to Watanabe. Little wonder they call him the Japanese Godfather. Perhaps predictably, the Yamaguchi Gumi is a major player in the underworld's Big Two: sex and drugs. According to Atsushi Mizoguchi, an author and authority on the underworld, Japan's 80,000 yakuza together earn around 1 trillion ($9.3 billion) a year, half of it from drugs, and about a quarter of it from the sex trade. FBI Operation Reveals Mob Control Of Porn From Newsday.com 5/26/01: Five prominent organized-crime figures have been convicted in a series of related cases that the FBI and federal prosecutors say show the mob controls the adult entertainment industry in Suffolk County [Long Island]. As part of a sting operation, the FBI helped run an adult video and entertainment center in Lake Ronkonkoma for two years. During the course of the sting operation at Cherry's Video at 1787 Lakeland Ave., the operators of that business and other similar ones nearby were approached and threatened by prominent members of the Gambino, Luchese and Bonanno organized-crime families, according to federal prosecutors Leonard Lato and Andrew Genser. The mobsters from the various families, who are bickering over control of many of Suffolk's adult businesses, wanted either a piece of the businesses or up to $500 a week in protection money, according to testimony by FBI organized-crime specialist Greg Hagarty at a recent Central Islip trial involving the Cherry's Video sting. The businesses usually feature a variety of activities, including the sale of X-rated videos and magazines, topless dancers and lap dances. When one of the operators of Cherry's complained that he should not have to pay for protection, an organized-crime enforcer, recorded on an FBI tape, told him: "Think of it like this. You gotta pay Lilco....You gotta pay your phone bill. You gotta pay your...rent...And you gotta pay us." At another time, as recorded by the FBI, when the Cherry's operator said he could go to the police for protection, he was told by a mob figure: "You could gear up that place with 28 guys every night, but you know what? One night they ain't there [laughing]. That'll be the night the guys roll up. You know what I mean." As a result of the sting, five organized-crime figures, including two close associates of former Gambino family head John Gotti, either have been convicted at trial or pleaded guilty in interrelated cases at the federal district court in Central Islip. Convicted on Tuesday of conspiracy to extort Cherry's were Salvatore Scala, 58, of 54 Meadowglen Rd., Northport, a captain in the Gambino organized-crime family; and Charles Carneglia, 55, of 94-20 Albert Rd., Ozone Park, a soldier in the family, according to federal prosecutors Lato and Genser. In a separate extortion attempt by another organized-crime family on the FBI's sting entertainment center, Thomas DiFiore, 57, of Dryden Way, Commack, a captain in the Bonanno organized-crime family, pleaded guilty Monday to extorting Cherry's in federal District Court in Central Islip. Also pleading guilty to racketeering in connection with the Gambino family's attempt to control adult entertainment centers were Carl Kline, 35, of 16 Ninth St., Ronkonkoma; and Kevin McMahon, 36, of 95-15 160th Ave., Howard Beach. Federal prosecutors Lato and Genser described them as associates of the Gambino family. According to court documents, the operator of Cherry's complained to the FBI in the summer of 1999 that he was being extorted by members of various organized-crime families. FBI agents wired the operator and began instructing him in running the adult center and dealing with the various mobsters. The sting produced evidence of how the members of the Gambino, Luchese and Bonanno families separately tried to control individual businesses, often arranging meetings among themselves to determine who controlled which business, according to Lato and Genser. |
