Louis Ferrante - Mob Rules: What the Mafia Can Teach the Legitimate Businessman

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Table of Contents

To Gabriella, and her mother, Angelika
an angel on Earth, the other in Heaven

The organization chart of a crime family or syndicate mirrors the management structure of a corporation. At the top of the pyramid is a boss, or chief executive. Below him are an underboss (chief operating officer) and a consigliere (general counsel). Then follow ranks of capos (vice presidents) and soldiers (lower-level employees who carry out the bosses orders). Like corporations, crime groups often rely on outside consultants.

Fortune magazine

AUTHORS NOTE

Readers of my memoir, Unlocked, know that in that book I had changed the names of men I had committed crimes with in order to conceal their true identities. I have never snitched on fellow mobsters or anyone else, and although I chose to leave the Mafia while in prison, I remain true to my former associates. In this book, with few exceptions, I use actual names since the mobsters I write about are dead, in prison, or have cooperated with the government. Nothing I write here can lead to criminal indictments. I am not uncovering crimes or pointing out targets for law enforcement, but simply highlighting the acute business sense of the Mafia.

Throughout this book, I refer to organized crime as the Mob or the Mafia. These serve as accessible terms; however, they are seldom if ever used by members of a crime family who refer to their organizations as La Cosa Nostra, meaning our thing, or the borgata, meaning the family.

I apologize in advance for any colorful language.

PREFACE

IN ancient Sparta, boys around the age of twelve underwent a peculiar education designed to sharpen their wits and teach them the skills necessary to succeed in a harsh world. In the hills surrounding the militaristic city-state, the boys were underfed to the point of starvation, then sent into town to steal food in order to survive. They would have to be clever and cunning; if caught, they were severely punished. Not for stealing, but for failing.

The Spartans believed that a young man who could master the skills of a thief would flourish in life. I dont advise anyone to become a thief in an effort to excel, but by studying the underlying nature of successful criminals, one can glean many valuable lessons.

A career of banditry in early youth often indicated a man of strong character and purpose.

Edgar Snow, Red Star over China

I began stealing at age twelve. I operated an automobile chop shop in my early teens, hijacked my first truck in my late teens, and was heading my own crew of much older men within the Gambino crime family by my early twenties. I was suspected of pulling off some of the largest heists in U.S. history before the age of twenty-one.

Without higher education, I relied on instincts to navigate the treacherous but profitable world of the Mafia, netting millions of dollars for my family, or company. At any given time, my life in the Mafia cast me in three separate roles. I was an employee for the Gambino family; I was the boss, or CEO, of my own crew; and I was middle management, taking orders from Mafia chieftains and handing them down to underlings. Thus, Im well qualified to speak to individuals on each rung of the corporate ladder.

I was never caught committing a crime, but information from confidential informants resulted in several investigations.

After a highly prosperous run, I was taken down by state law enforcement officers and federal agents, who pieced together cases against me using these informants. I faced the rest of my life in prison, and was asked to cooperate against other mobsters in return for my freedom. I refused to inform on friends and associates, and my lawyers negotiated a plea bargain after the main snitch against me was thrown out of the governments Witness Protection Program. I was sentenced to twelve and a half years and sent to the maximum security penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania.

In prison, I realized that crime was wrong. Sure, life is a struggle and we cant live it on our knees, but I didnt have the right to victimize people. I decided to change my life.

While in prison, I read my first book. It wasnt easy at first; my vocabulary sucked, as did my attention span and ability to grasp whatever I read. But I stuck with it and discovered the joy of reading. Soon, stacks of books lined the floor of my cell, were shoved under my bunk, and piled around the toilet. Where posters of nude women decorated the stone walls of other cons cells, maps covered mine. For years, I read every day until the muscles in my eyes ached and I would conk out from sheer exhaustion. A few hours sleep, long enough to rest my eyes, then back to the books. My cell became a live-in classroom where I studied every subject possible. I personally reversed one of my federal cases from prison and was released after serving eight and a half years. By then, Id taught myself the art of writing by analyzing the novels of nineteenth-century masters and I had written a novel of my own.

Upon my release from prison, I had this glorious notion that I was leaving criminal behavior behind, and with it the variety of rogues Id dealt with on a daily basis on the street. I dreamed of taking up my place in the legit world. How different it would be from the life Id known.

To my surprise, I realized that my idea of the legit world was a fantasy. I soon encountered creeps in legal society far worse than many of the mobsters Id knownthese wolves all hid in sheeps clothing.

As a loan shark, I never increased the interest rate on someones loan. If anything, I dropped the rate as a reward for timely payments. Credit card companies increase your rate, regardless of your history, and do so without your knowledgeable consent. How about all those hidden fees? Its in the small print, one customer service rep told me. You should have read it. Thats like me increasing someones vig on a loan, and saying to him, When I gave you the money, I whispered that part. You should have heard me.

Collection agencies call a persons house and harass whoever answers the phone. They dont care if your mom or grandmother is about to drop dead. Too bad, pay up! Say what you want about the Mob, but Mafia code forbids mobsters to even go near a mans home, let alone harass his family.

Banks foreclose on homes and toss the occupants into the street. The local sheriff issues a court order, locks the door, and throws the family out. Id bet any dad who lives through that would rather deal with us. You might get a couple of broken bones, maybe a black eye; big deal, you still own your home.

Lets be real: mobsters are selfish men, out for personal gain, but so are businessmen. Mobsters may kill their own, but everyone else gets a little slack. Most businessmen, banks, and credit card companies prey on everyone.

We only kill each other.

Benjamin Bugsy Siegel

As a mobster, I was feared, so vultures stayed clear of me. As a legit guy, I became fair game; everyone tried to screw me.

Coming home from prison, I needed a car and an apartment.

Time and again, I was bullshitted by car salesmen with the old bait-and-switch. Every time I was ready to sign on the dotted line, the deal changed.

I rented an apartment. During the winter, my landlord wouldnt turn up the heat, but the cheap bastard wanted his rent on time. I had to buy an electric heater. When I left and asked for my security back, he hemmed and hawed, claimed he didnt have it.

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