Mob Rules

by Louis Ferrante

  Nonchalantly, he replied, “They got guys like us for this. They got guys like them for that.”

  His was a brilliant statement in all of its simplicity. The world has people cut out for all different things. Together, we make the Earth go round.

  Al Capone called the stock market a “racket” and knew enough to stay out of it. But most people aren’t as realistic about their limits as Capone.

  I knew a guy on the street I’ll call Bobby. Bobby knew mobsters all his life, might’ve exchanged a couple of favors with them over the years, but for the most part, he was legit. Through hard work, Bobby built up a successful private sanitation business. Like any smart businessman who accumulates wealth, Bobby dabbled in real estate.

  As a landlord, Bobby rented out a building to a restaurateur. The restaurant failed and the owner abandoned the lease but left behind the ovens, tables, and a nicely decorated place. Instead of renting the building to someone new, Bobby took over the restaurant. He hired a top-notch chef and began to advertise.

  Bobby knew that mobsters are big spenders, so he invited all the mobsters he knew to his place. Although Bobby was a little out of his realm, he pulled it off; the restaurant was packed.

  So far, no mistakes. Bobby had spotted an opportunity and turned garbage into gold. His wealth and reputation increased.

  Next, Bobby stepped into a realm he knew nothing about.

  All day and night, Bobby rubbed shoulders with mobsters. Soon, they rubbed off on him, and Bobby began to think of himself as a mobster. After all, he was rich, he could live out any fantasy, right?

  Bobby raised the floor in a corner of his restaurant and put an oval table with a telephone there. Every night during dinner, patrons could see Bobby dressed in pin-striped suits with silk hankies, dialing or answering the phone. All he needed was a fluffy white cat on his lap.

  Knowing that real wiseguys often ate there, young Mob wannabes began to frequent the place. When the real wiseguys shunned them, Bobby saw an opportunity to mobilize the rejects and form his own crew.

  Soon, the wannabes were pulling off scores and bringing Bobby an end.

  Here’s a guy worth millions, who abandons a thriving sanitation business to accept a measly case of scotch from a stolen liquor truck here, or a crate of swag cigarettes there. He even left his wife for a bimbo.

  When the feds found out that Bobby’s restaurant was a Mafia hot spot, they set up surveillance cameras across the street. Bobby then did what any Mafia big shot would do, who really isn’t a Mafia big shot, and really didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. He ordered his crew of misfits to burn down the building where the FBI had set up their cameras. This act is equivalent to entering the J. Edgar Hoover building in Washington, D.C., walking straight up to the FBI director, and spitting in his face.

  Unfortunately for Bobby, the FBI director was indeed an FBI director, not someone who was pretending. The feds nailed Bobby’s ass to the wall. One by one, they turned his all-star cast of idiots into stool pigeons, closed down his restaurant, and slapped him with a multi-count racketeering indictment.

  Bobby lost his wife, his kids, his sanitation business, and his freedom. And for what? To play wiseguy.

  How many rich businessmen think their wealth translates into wisdom, and believe they can master any field and live out any fantasy?

  Bobby’s mistake isn’t unique; it’s an error repeated throughout history.

  During the days of ancient Rome, a guy named Crassus had a genius for business affairs and became filthy rich. Financial success convinced Crassus that he could conquer any field, even a battlefield.

  With no experience in warfare, Crassus set out to conquer the Parthian Empire. He dismissed the warnings of experienced generals because, after all, he was rich and they weren’t. Instead of dying a proud, wealthy man, sipping a martini while getting a blowjob, Crassus died in shame, brutally murdered at the hands of his enemies. He also dragged thirty thousand legionnaires into the grave with him.

  Didn’t Bobby drag his family and employees down with him?

  Stick to what you know.

  LESSON 87

  Marcus Aurelius Was a Great Emperor, but That Doesn’t Mean His Son Was: The Perils of Nepotism

  WHEN making a historical drama, Hollywood will happily sacrifice accuracy to jazz up a film. The film Gladiator, starring Russell Crowe, was no different, except the filmmakers were spot-on portraying Marcus Aurelius as a great Roman emperor and his son Commodus as a total loser.

  The real-life Marcus Aurelius kept a personal notebook we now call the Meditations, which serves as a practical guide to living in a crazy world. As old as it is, the book applies perfectly today because, as you’ve learned, human nature is constant.

  In the opening pages of the Meditations, Marcus Aurelius thanks his family and friends for what they’ve taught him: “From my grandfather, good morals; my father, modesty; my mother, piety; my governor, hard labor . . .” The list goes on.

  Marcus Aurelius didn’t write about the unpleasant things he received from people, like the agita he got from his son, Commodus. He passed on that agita to the Roman people when he allowed the bum to assume his throne. Commodus abandoned himself to a life of luxury and sexual depravity. Instead of governing the empire, he was fighting in the Colosseum or throwing wild orgies. His hands-off approach to governing left the empire spiraling out of control.

  Marcus Aurelius made a major mistake some Mob bosses have repeated, and others have wisely avoided.

  For a long time, Bernardo Provenzano shared leadership of the Sicilian Mafia with Totò Riina. Provenzano and Riina came from the same peasant stock. Both were born and raised in the Sicilian village of Corleone. They began their criminal careers around the same time and suffered similar ups and downs on their way up the Mafia ladder. They reached the top together, and became corulers of a billion-dollar empire.

  Provenzano was a mild-mannered man who offered sound advice to his followers and often counseled peace. Many of his men referred to him as “The Philosopher.” Riina, on the other hand, was quick to kill, and his men nicknamed him “The Beast.”

  Provenzano and Riina each had two sons but, given their respective nicknames, it’s not surprising that only one of them was able to accurately assess his son’s potential.

  [Provenzano] was worried his sons might become part of Cosa Nostra. He wanted to stop this happening before it was too late.

  —Chief anti-Mafia prosecutor Pietro Grasso

  Provenzano knew that his sons, raised under far different circumstances than he had been, were totally unequipped to inhabit, much less rule, the treacherous world of La Cosa Nostra. Thus, he kept them far away from the family business, assessed their attributes, and guided them toward appropriate career paths. Both went to university and pursued respectable careers.

  While Provenzano was pushing his sons away from organized crime, Riina was drawing his own sons closer. When Riina was sent to prison for life, he appointed his older son, Giovanni, as don.

  As corulers of the Sicilian Mafia, the Philosopher and the Beast complemented each other; their combination of attributes was the recipe for success. Giovanni, however, was all beast like his father. With no one to temper his brutality, he launched a bloody reign. Unfit to rule, he received a dozen life sentences by age twenty-four.

  I started learning about guns when I was six . . . my father also taught me . . . to aim for the head and get off at least two bullets.

  —Albert DeMeo, son of Mafia hit man Roy DeMeo

  The difficulties of ruling Italy during the time of Marcus Aurelius, or ruling Italy’s underworld during the time of Provenzano and Riina, were very similar. The job required a peculiar character, born of unique experiences.

  I rule with my head.

  —Bernardo Provenzano

  Your kids, being raised in a successful household, have a different set of experiences that may not make them well suited to your path.

  Still, if you think your
son or daughter can run your business, and you’re willing to subject them to the stress of leadership, go for it. But make that decision with your head, like Bernardo Provenzano, not your heart.

  LESSON 88

  Leave the Gun, Take the Cannolis . . . and Beware of Hubris

  WHEN I left the Mob, I left the bad things behind—the gun—and kept the sweet things I’d picked up along the way—the cannolis. This gun-cannoli formula, which involves looking back at our past, can be instrumental in helping anyone change for the better.

  Not one moment of our lives, even those moments we prefer to forget, has been for naught if we analyze and learn from each of our experiences. And the wealth of wisdom our past can provide is demonstrative of the universal lessons we can glean from a broad study of history.

  Throughout this book, I pointed out the striking similarities between historical events and situations we encounter every day. I sometimes mentioned the ancient Greeks. In addition to everything else the Greeks have taught us, they pointed out the successful man’s propensity to gloat. Having attained wealth and power, leaders from all walks of life often exhibit outrageous pride and arrogance. Convinced of their own brilliance, they dismiss rational advice or refuse advice altogether. This, the Greeks called hubris.

  Since a leader’s decisions affect so many, his hubris will also imperil many. Should you reach the top, I’ll warn you now that it is there you will have to confront your most formidable opponent—yourself. This brings me to one final lesson in which I’ll draw a remarkable comparison between three different leaders: the head of a nation, the boss of a Mafia family, and a CEO, each of whom suffered from hubris.

  During his reign, Adolf Hitler proudly proclaimed, “I am Fuhrer of a Reich that will last for a thousand years.” Hitler’s “thousand-year Reich” lasted twelve years, and his German nation was destroyed along with it.

  During his reign, John Gotti was caught on audiotape proudly proclaiming, “This is gonna be a Cosa Nostra till I die. Be it an hour from now, or be it tonight, or a hundred years from now.”

  Gotti’s “hundred-year Cosa Nostra” was in disarray less than two years after this tape was recorded. His Gambino family was dismantled by informants and never again achieved its prominent influence.

  During his reign, CEO Kenneth Lay sent an e-mail to his employees saying, “We have the finest organization in American business today.”

  Lay’s “finest organization,” Enron, collapsed less than four months after this e-mail was sent. The company’s destruction was so fast and total that twenty thousand employees were given thirty minutes to clean out their desks. Lay was picked up on federal charges and convicted in criminal court, just like Gotti.

  The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rocks, who occupy the heights of the hill. Though you build your nest as high as the eagle’s, from there I will bring you down, declares the Lord.

  —Jeremiah 49:16

  Hitler, Gotti, and Lay all clawed their way up the ladder but got dizzy with success and suffered from hubris.

  Always remember, it can take you years to get to the top but less than a minute to fall. The Empire State Building has 1,860 steps that would take a fit person thirty minutes to climb. A fall from the top takes a matter of seconds—unless you’re Superman and can fly. You’re not Superman. And that’s the point.

  After you achieve that success you’ve dreamed of, beware of hubris.

  EPILOGUE

  Be a Pizza Egg Roll

  FEW men in the Mob have actually read Machiavelli’s The Prince, but nearly every wiseguy prides himself on being “Machiavellian.” They have an idea that “Machiavellian” means to conquer men “by force and by fraud,” and that appeals to them.

  I’ve read Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince, and it’s discouraging to see that so many of today’s business books have basically repackaged what Machiavelli wrote five hundred years ago and, by doing so, led people down the wrong path in life. Today’s lack of ethics in business can be traced, in part, to these contemporary imitations.

  Machiavelli was accurate in his assessment of human flaws, but life’s journey should include a daily struggle against our base impulse to succeed at any cost. We can’t simply surrender to our primitive instincts, as Machiavelli suggests.

  Machiavelli tells us to gain and keep the upper hand by any means, that there’s no such thing as justice, honor, or integrity, and that morality should play no part in our dealings, unless we’re pretending. But Machiavelli failed to address that little idea called karma.

  I’ve been up close and personal with men who’ve held immense power, and I’ve had considerable power in my own hands; my experiences prove that there are undeniable consequences to our actions. By omitting this central fact, Machiavelli may be responsible for the great fortunes of a dozen or so men and women who were completely numb to the welfare of others, and the misfortunes of millions who eat, sleep, and breathe like the rest of us.

  While Machiavelli’s instruction may help you achieve success in business or politics, it guarantees your failure in other aspects of life, leaving you with no friends and relatives who hate you. Rich but poor. Successful but sad. Social but lonely. Is this what you want? Money and power at any cost?

  Machiavelli’s advice may help you attain great heights, but you’ll find it very lonely at the top, living the life of a miserable fuck who suffers from paranoia, sleepless nights, and pangs of conscience. These ailments will eventually wear you down, one way or another.

  I’ve sat beside Mob bosses at the height of their power, and shared the same cockroach-infested cells with them after they were stripped of that power. Alone, in private conversation, some have confessed their regrets to me. One, in particular, told me that his exalted position on the street made the pain of prison that much worse. This brought to mind a passage I’d read in Caesar’s autobiography in which he said, “When the immortal gods wish to punish a guilty man, they often grant him all the more prosperity, all the longer impunity, simply that he may suffer the more when his good fortune is reversed.”

  You may know Machiavellian businesspeople who appear successful. Are you privy to their private lives? Can you see tomorrow? All that we do, good and bad, is repaid in kind.

  Confucius was a Chinese philosopher who counseled wisdom, justice, and moderation. He told leaders to rule, not by force, but by virtue. His philosophy is the polar opposite of Machiavelli’s.

  Virtue’s a thing that none can take away, but money changes owners all day.

  —Plutarch, Life of Solon

  I advise you to read Machiavelli’s The Prince for an understanding of how low your competitors may stoop, and then rise above the muck and follow the path of Confucius. Be a pizza egg roll.

  Have true goals. Treat people with dignity. And strive to make our world a better place. I assure you, you can do this and get rich in the process, for wealth, without wisdom, is wasted.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A special thanks to my friend Harry Stein. Harry and I often talked about my life in the Mafia and he suggested that many of the stories I shared with him would make an interesting book. Another special thanks to Nick Pileggi, a true man of honor in every way.

  To my father, my stepmother, Betty, my sister, Lisa, and my brother-in-law, Ralph; my cousins Donald and Debbie, Denise and John; my Uncle Anthony and Aunt Claudette; Fat George, Rita, Norma and Jerry, Donna C., Louis and his father-in-law, Richie, Ronnie and Tish. Thank you all for being there for me during those horrible years in a prison cell.

  To John “Johnny Parkway” Brunetti, David Black, Tommy Gallagher, Robin Shamburg, Ruda Dauphin, Rabbi Arthur Rulnick, Marshall and Sandy Rulnick, Paul and Karen Dawson, Burt and Suzy Farbman, and Bill Yosses.

  To Mario the Gardener and his brother, John. Dave Berman, John Farrar, Tim Shaw, Billy Rothar, Beth Birnbaum, Kieran and Sarah McLoughlin, Renee Queen, Charles and Joseph Lamberta, Edward Kanaley, Vic Orena, Jr., Michael Sessa, and Ma
rkos Pappas.

  To Kevin Van Name, who stood up and served a stint in prison, went straight, and opened up Harrison House, a place where alcoholics and drug addicts are put on the right path.

  Thanks to the late Jerry Bauer, Rhoda Pobliner, and Richard Messina, who died in prison—thank you for everything you taught me, Richard.

  To the generous W. Dahveed Rubin, who sent me my first complete edition of The Babylonian Talmud.

  To my friend and agent, Lisa Queen, and my editors at Portfolio, Emily Angell, David Moldawer, and Adrian Zackheim.

  To my love, Gabriella, who is more beautiful every day.

  To my mother, Jo Ann, who worked so hard and taught me so much but never saw the fruits of her labor.

  And to Almighty God, who, in a dark and lonely prison cell, opened my eyes.

  NOTES

  vii The organization chart: Roy Rowan, “The Fifty Biggest Mafia Bosses,” Fortune, November 10, 1986, pp. 24–35.

  xix A career of banditry: Edgar Snow, Red Star over China: The Classic Account of the Birth of Chinese Communism, First Revised and Enlarged Edition (New York: Grove Press, 1968), p. 44.

  xxii We only kill: Carl Sifakis, The Mafia Encyclopedia: From Accardo to Zwillman, Third Edition (New York: Checkmark Books, 2005), p. 418.

  xxii Jonathan Swift: Jacques Barzun, From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present: 500, Years of Western Cultural Life (New York: HarperCollins, 2000), p. 328.

  xxii Whereas I, lost: Pierre de Beaumarchais, The Marriage of Figaro, trans. John Wood (New York: Penguin Books, 2004), p. 199.

  xxiii There are now: Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne, Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, New and Revised Edition, ed. R. W. Phipps, Volume 1 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1891), p. 401.

  1 Mr. Persico . . . you are: Selwyn Raab, Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America’s Most Powerful Mafia Empires (New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2005), p. 348.