Word: colombo
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Eventually, Colombo engineered a truce between the warring Mafia factions. At the same time he added to his power in another way. Two of the Mafia bosses, Joe Bonanno and Joe Magliocco, decided to let a contract for the extinction of three of their rivals: Carlo Gambino and Thomas Lucchese of New York City, and Slefano Magaddino of Buffalo. Who should be picked for the job but enterprising...
...Colombo? In this case, however, Joe thought the victims would be worth more to him than the contract. So he tipped them off. Bonanno made his hasty, celebrated disappearance and the "Bananas War" got under way. Some seven mobsters were slain, but once again Colombo escaped with profit...
...lives with his wife, his two unmarried sons and a daughter, is scarcely distinguishable from other houses in the neighborhood. Hidden away in Orange County, N.Y., is a more appropriate setting for a Mafia boss: an extensive estate, complete with tennis courts, a swimming pool and a horseracing track. Colombo is also a skillful handball player and shoots golf in the middle...
...Colombo has been able to account for an income of about $18,000 a year through real estate dealings; associates report that he rarely has any difficulty collecting his commissions. On a Dick Cavett television show, Colombo explained that he also owns a piece of a florist shop and of a funeral home. When the studio audience laughed at the mortuary connection, Colombo bridled. He was not trying to be funny, he said, and he did not find the matter at all amusing...
When U.S. Attorney General John Mitchell stepped up the war on organized crime, Colombo lost his cool. He became angered when the FBI trailed him, questioned his friends and family and arrested Joseph Jr. (he was later acquitted). In that anger the Italian-American Civil Rights League was born...