by Kitty Kelley
Frank’s rush to Catholicism startled people who remembered him as virulently anti-Catholic, especially those who had attended the party given by Billy and Audrey Wilder in Malibu when Frank was married to Mia Farrow. He had spent most of the evening in a corner with model Anita Colby disparaging the church while she, a devout Catholic, smiled tolerantly. “Don’t worry, Frank. We’ll get you in the end. We’ll get you in the end.” He laughed at her. “He thought I meant we’d poke him in the bottom,” she said many years later, “but what I really meant was that Catholicism is the toughest religion to live by but the greatest one to die by and that’s when Frank would come back.”
Frank had experienced what he regarded as the hypocrisy of the Catholic church in Hoboken, where the Italians had to go to St. Ann’s in Little Italy and were not allowed to go to Our Lady of Grace with the uptown Irish and Germans. And that uptown church had barred him from hiring the orchestra for its Friday night dances because his mother had been convicted of performing abortions.
“He wasn’t a churchgoer, and neither was I,” said Nick Sevano, his childhood friend. “We observed the religion as descendants from Italian immigrants that were Catholic, but it was something that we just observed. There were other Italians more observing than us.”
“His parents were devout Catholics and they worried about the consequences of his divorces, which in those days were considered anathema for a Catholic and synonymous with eternal damnation,” said Thomas F. X. Smith, former mayor of Jersey City. “In the 1960s, St. Peter’s College gave a dinner honoring the pope’s encyclical ‘Rerum Novarum,’ and Richard Cardinal Cushing of Boston was the featured speaker. At a reception beforehand, Dolly and Marty, both in their sixties at the time, were dying to meet the cardinal, especially Dolly, who was overwhelmed by the prospect. I made the introduction, and Cardinal Cushing gave them a warm reception, but poor Dolly burst into tears because of the divorce business. The cardinal immediately put his arm around her and said, ‘Now, where is that skinny son of yours? He came up to Boston a while back, raised a ton of money for a children’s home, and then left before I could thank him for how well he’s doing the Lord’s work.’ That was the best thing he could’ve possibly said to Dolly at the time, because she was so worried about the state of her son’s soul.”
Eager to please his mother, especially after his marriage to Barbara, Frank had listened to a mobster who had come up with the scam of promising him membership in the exalted Knights of Malta in exchange for ten thousand dollars and a few songs. Jimmy “The Weasel” Fratianno knew that Frank had been trying to be accepted by the oldest and most exclusive social order of chivalry in the world. The Maltese Cross, which is awarded for outstanding accomplishment and service to humanity, had been given to only seven hundred people in a thousand years, and Frank longed to be among the American knights approved by the Vatican, who included Lee Iacocca, president of Chrysler Corporation; Barron Hilton, president of the Hilton Hotel Corporation; Robert Abplanalp, the aerosol magnate; former New York mayor Robert Wagner; and J. Peter Grace, chairman and chief executive officer of W. R. Grace & Company. Thus, when the Mafia murderer proposed to induct Frank into what Fratianno called the Red Knights and said it was a division of the Catholic organization that did not require Vatican approval for induction, Sinatra leaped.
“I’ve been trying to get into the Knights of Malta for fifteen years,” he said. “My mother’s a devout Catholic, and I know this would mean so much to her.”
Fratianno then introduced him to a Hungarian “Knight of Malta” named Ivan Markovics. Mickey Rudin judged Markovics to be a con man preparing to rip Frank off with a fraudulent scheme, but Sinatra didn’t listen to his lawyer. Blinded by the respectability he thought such an award would bring, he insisted on writing a check for ten thousand dollars, and promised to do a benefit for the Knights at the Westchester Premier Theater, an affair that would later prove to produce money for the mobsters behind the scenes. Days later, Fratianno called Rudin to say that Frank had been approved as a “Knight,” and Frank ecstatically made arrangements to receive his scroll, medals, diplomatic passport, and flag at the house of his neighbor and friend, Tommy Marson, in Rancho Mirage. Fratianno had promised him that a prince of Italy and cardinals in scarlet silk robes would induct him into the sacred knighthood.
A few days later, Frank was summoned to Tommy Marson’s house, where Ivan Markovics was decked out in a red silk robe with a white Maltese cross and gold medals hanging from silk ribbons around his neck. With great flourish, he presented Frank with a scroll embroidered with Latin words, a red silk box with gold medals, a red flag with the white Maltese cross, and a red passport with a Maltese cross. Afterward, he began telling Frank about the great investiture they planned for him. “As you know, I personally went to Rome and spoke with Prince Petrucci, accompanied by two cardinals from the Vatican. They will bring a special papal blessing for you and your mother.”
Continuing the charade, Markovics said: “It looks quite promising that Prince Bernhard of Holland will also attend if we can arrange for his transportation. And there are many prominent members in the United States who would like to personally welcome you into the order on the day of your investiture if transportation can be arranged for them.”
“That’s no problem,” said Sinatra. “I’ll have a plane for them at LaGuardia and arrangements will be made for their stay at the Canyon here in Palm Springs. Can we do it in December?”
“We better think in terms of January or February … I’ve got to organize all these people, send out invitations. It all takes time, but believe me it will be worth it. It’s going to be the most fantastic affair imaginable, something deserving of a man of your exalted station in life.”
Sinatra smiled. “Well, well,” he said. “Recognition at last.”
Dolly’s plane crashed before the investiture took place, so she never knew of her son’s pseudo-knighthood or how the Mafia had duped him. Having paid ten thousand dollars for membership, Frank proudly flew his Knights of Malta flag from his Palm Springs home and gave Barbara the Maltese cross to wear when they entertained at benefits with Barron Hilton, who is a real Knight of Malta.
Determined to honor his mother’s memory in the best way he could, Frank applied for an annulment of his marriage to Nancy Barbato. His decision so rocked the family that his daughter Nancy called a UPI reporter in Los Angeles in a rage, hoping the wire service would write a story about it. The children believed that the church dissolution would mark them as illegitimate in the eyes of society, though in fact an annulment does nothing to affect legitimacy or the laws of inheritance. Frank had to send a priest to convince his children that the dissolution of his marriage to their mother would not harm them in the least.
In 1977, when the Catholic bishops of the United States removed the penalty of excommunication from Catholics who divorce and remarry, it became far easier to have a marriage annulled. No longer is it necessary to apply to Rome, to hire a canon lawyer, to pay thousands of dollars to the Vatican. Nor is it required to have the consent of the marriage partner. Annulments can now be granted by the diocesan marriage tribunal after application by one spouse, and the process takes from six months to two years. Few are denied.
Frank received his annulment in 1978, but he did not announce it then or when Reverend Raymond Bluett married him and Barbara in Palm Springs. It was when he was photographed taking Holy Communion in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York the following year that a rash of press stories appeared around the world.
“Did Frank Make the Vatican an Offer It Couldn’t Refuse?” asked the Los Angeles Herald Examiner.
“Sinatra Stars in Storm over Catholic Divorces,” said the London Observer.
The letters-to-the-editor columns reverberated for weeks with outrage from readers who were unaware of the dramatic new changes within the Catholic church and resented what they thought was Frank’s new standing. Reverend Edgar Holden, O.F.M., wrote to the Daily News: “If Frank S
inatra received Holy Communion … I’m happy for him. I’d also presume he felt he had a right in conscience to do so. As for his first marriage being annulled, that’s none of my business, or, for that matter, anyone else’s.”
Most readers disagreed. “The fact that Sinatra obtained this annulment three marriages after a valid marriage many years ago in the church to a Catholic lady who bore him three children raises many questions in the eyes of Catholics and non-Catholics alike,” wrote one Joseph M. Kelly. “Did his power and influence play a role in this unusual annulment? To that extent, it is our business.”
“The annulment was very embarrassing for Nancy, Sr.,” said her close friend, Kitty Kallen. “She wishes she knew more about it. She doesn’t understand how [Frank got it] and people are saying terrible things, that she got paid off, which isn’t true at all. I know that for a fact!”
“I think he did it for his mother,” said Edie Goetz. “He got that annulment to honor her memory.”
32
Palm Springs, the lush desert oasis nestled at the base of the San Jacinto Mountains, is a citadel of organized crime. Nowhere in America is the Mafia’s presence more blatant than in this resort, which is home to more than one hundred gangsters, including Anthony “Big Tuna” Accardo, Chicago’s Mafia boss, who oversees his family’s business interests in Las Vegas from his condominium a few miles from the Sinatra compound.
For years the sheriffs department kept track of organized crime figures and their friends and associates in the area. Heading the sheriffs list was the honorary mayor of Cathedral City, Francis Albert Sinatra, of 70588 Frank Sinatra Drive, Rancho Mirage. Also on the list were Chicago syndicate member John Lardino, identified in law enforcement intelligence files as a “former syndicate gunman who posed as a respectable union official”; Frank Calabrese, another Chicago hoodlum; Rene “The Painter” Piccarreto, a former lieutenant in the Rochester, New York mob, a man California investigators believe is an important conduit for laundering profits from New York rackets; Vincent Dominic Caci of the Buffalo Mafia family, who moved to Palm Springs after his release from prison.
The most prevalent criminal activity in the area is conspiracy, but according to prosecutors it is one of the most difficult crimes to prove.
“Some big hoodlums may put their heads together in the Coachella Valley and plan a crime,” said Riverside County Sheriff Ben Clark, “but the actual crime they’re planning won’t occur here; it may happen in Chicago, Detroit, Kansas City, New York, or New Jersey.”
In 1976, such a crime occurred in Tarrytown, New York. The mob built the Westchester Premier Theater, a seven-million-dollar, thirty-five-hundred-seat facility for live entertainment that went bankrupt within a year after the Mafia reaped millions by illicitly skimming profits. With shows featuring Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, the promoters packed the house. First-year revenues alone amounted to $5.3 million. Yet by December 1976 the Westchester Premier Theater was near bankruptcy. Only Frank’s concerts in May 1977, for which he was paid $800,000, delayed the theater’s closing.
Federal agents, who were investigating another matter, tapped the phone of Sinatra’s friend Tommy Marson in Palm Springs and heard him talking to Gregory DePalma, who was linked to the Carlo Gambino crime family in New York and was running the Westchester theater. The two men discussed a plan “to siphon off money from an upcoming Frank Sinatra appearance at the Westchester theater in New York to keep [the money] from bankruptcy officials.”
This conversation triggered a massive investigation into the theater’s affairs. The result was the ten indictments handed down by a New York federal grand jury in June 1978, charging that racketeers defrauded the theater’s investors, stole the assets by illegally skimming receipts, and threw the company into bankruptcy.
Throughout the investigation and trial, Frank’s name dominated the headlines, beginning with reports that Mafia chieftain Carlo Gambino had helped finance the theater with a $100,000 investment on condition that Frank be signed up to perform. Before the proceedings were over, the federal prosecutor, Nathaniel H. Akerman, disclosed in court documents that an unnamed accomplice witness said that Frank had received $50,000 in cash “under the table” from one of the first two series of concerts. Frank was never charged.
On June 1, 1977, Gregory DePalma was talking to Salvadore Cannatella about a concession at the theater, the “T-shirt money.”
DePalma said, “I took care of Louie out of that, Eliot, Ritchie, me, you, Mickey, Tom, and Jilly.”
“Who Mickey?” said Cannatella.
“Mickey Rudin,” said DePalma.
“Oh. He gets picked oh wha [sic] his—his cut from the thing right?”
“Yeah,” said DePalma. “Well, I gave him my, er, I gave him five thousand dollars for the books.” (The books referred to Frank Sinatra program books that were printed and sold by Sinatra’s organization, not the theater.)
On April 15, 1977, William Marchiondo, a New Mexico lawyer, called Tommy Marson, asking for twenty tickets to the Sinatra show. Marson said this was a problem because he held back three hundred for each of New York’s five (Mafia) families and Sinatra got five hundred tickets a night.
On May 7, 1977, DePalma and Louis Pacella discussed the T-shirts for the Sinatra-Dean Martin concert. They also discussed their difficulties in fending off Mickey Rudin’s requests for additional seats. The government later claimed that Mickey Rudin’s demand for these additional seats revealed his authority in handling the financial affairs of a Sinatra concert and might shed light on subsequent skimming and ticket scalping that led to the bankruptcy, but testimony concerning Rudin was ruled inadmissible.
Frank’s first appearance at the Westchester Premier Theater was in April 1976, when he was moving from the soigné world of dinners with Governor Hugh Carey at “21” to meetings with “made” men at Sepret Tables, a Mafia restaurant on Third Avenue owned by Louis Pacella, also known as “The Dome” or “Louie Dones.” Pacella, a capo in the organized crime family of “Funzy” Tieri, was identified by the Drug Enforcement Administration as dealing in heroin and cocaine. His lawyer said that he and Frank were “very, very, very close and dear friends … they were brothers, not because they share the same mother and father but because they shared love, admiration, and friendship for many, many years.”
It was Louie Pacella who booked Frank into the Westchester Premier Theater in April and September 1976, and who persuaded him to come back in September 1977 for another performance, which would stave off bankruptcy proceedings for several months.
During his first engagement at the Westchester Premier Theater, Frank posed for pictures with New York Mayor Abe Bearne and then sang for an audience that included the Mafia hierarchy of Jimmy “The Weasel” Fratianno, Mike Rizzitello of Los Angeles, Tony Spilotro of Las Vegas, Russell Bufalino of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and several associates of Philadelphia boss Angelo Bruno. On April 10, 1976, he met Jackie Kennedy Onassis and the Peter Duchins at P. J. Clarke’s in Manhattan after his evening show. The next night backstage in his dressing room, he put his arms around Greg DePalma and Tommy Marson and posed for a picture with Carlo Gambino, Jimmy Fratianno, Paul Castellano, Gambino’s successor, Joseph Gambino, Carlo’s nephew, and Ritchie “Nerves” Fusco. The prosecution introduced this photograph into the trial, which was reprinted in newspapers around the world. When Lee Solters, Frank’s publicist since 1974, was asked to explain how the Mafia men managed to get so close to the singer, who was guarded at all times, he said, “I didn’t hear a word you said.” Pressed on the matter, he said, “I can’t say anything.”
The prosecution’s major witness was Jimmy Fratianno, who cooperated with the government when he found out there was a Mafia contract on his life. He became the highest-ranking Cosa Nostra member to date to turn informer. Despite his record as an acting organized crime boss guilty of eleven gangland murders, the courts recognized him as an expert witness, and his testimony convicted more than twenty men
since 1977.
Fratianno admitted to the Knights of Malta scam and claimed that after an informal induction ceremony in Palm Springs he took Frank aside and asked him for a favor. “Look, Frank, our [crime] family’s in trouble,” he said. “We’ve got people in jail and we’ve got to make some money, know what I mean?”
“Certainly,” said Frank. “What can I do to help?”
“Number one, Frank, the Knights ain’t got no money. The answer to both the Knights and our family could be solved if you did a benefit. Two days, four performances. I’ve talked to Greg DePalma, and you could do them at the Westchester Premier Theater. You know, add a couple of days to your next concert there. We’ve got a good working system over there. We’re with the right people, you know. You understand what I mean, Frank?”
“Oh, absolutely,” said Sinatra. “My pleasure, Jimmy. Have Greg [DePalma] work out a schedule with Mickey. Now, Jimmy, when you want to talk to me, work through Mickey, he’s my buffer. But if he bulls you, go to Jilly and I’ll straighten Mickey out. That way I don’t have to [mess] around with business deals.”
Jimmy thanked Frank, saying, “The family will appreciate it, believe me, and if ever there’s anything we can do for you, just say the word and you’ve got it.”
Fratianno claimed that the word came days later from Jilly Rizzo, who said Frank wanted a Mafia contract on Andy “Banjo” Celentano, a former bodyguard of Sinatra, who had written a few articles for the National Enquirer.
“Now we hear this Banjo’s writing a book about Frank,” said Jilly, “and we want this stopped once and for all. Know what I mean?”