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1968 1972 Obituaries LARRY + JOE


The New York Times, April 8, 1972

JOE GALLO WAS SHOT TO DEATH IN LITTLE ITALY RESTAURANT
by Eric page

… Joe Gallo, the Mafia figure known as Crazy Joe, was assassinated early yesterday as he celebrated his 43rd birthday in a restaurant on Mulberry Street one block east of police headquarters.
… The police said they knew neither the identity nor motive of the middle-aged killer, who also wounded Gallo's bodyguard in a gunbattle that spilled out into the narrow streets of Little Italy section. The killer fled by car.
… But Gallo's sister, Mrs. Carmela Fiorello, sobbing over her brother's body, reportedly said, "He changed his image – that's why this happened." She was treated for shock.
… "This is a gangland operation," said Chief of Detectives Albert A. Seedman. He added that he had learned yesterday that Gallo planned to reactivate a civil rights group called Americans of Italian descent.
… The head of the group, former Rep. Alfred Santangelo, said Gallo had met with him and volunteered his services.
… Another operation, the Italian-American Civil Rights League, was founded by Joseph A Colombo Sr., whose Mafia family has feuded for years with the Gallo clan.
… Well-placed informants said yesterday that the Colombo family had discussed "getting" Gallo ever since Colombo was critically wounded in an assassination attempt last June 28.
… But Chief Seedman, speaking to reporters outside the bullet-pocked restaurant, said the killing might also have stemmed from rivalry with in the Gallo family, which has long been powerful in Brooklyn. He added that "the speculation is wide open at this time."
… Chief Seedman said the police planned to arrest the bodyguard, Pete Diapoulas, 42, for illegal possession of a 32 caliber pistol found outside the restaurant, Umberto's claim house, at 129 Mulberry St. No other arrests were made yesterday.
… Diapoulas was reported in satisfactory condition at the Beekman-Downtown Hospital after being shot in the left hip. He was under police guard.
… Gallo was pronounced dead in the same hospital after being taken there in a police car. He was shot in the left elbow, left buttock and back. The shot in the back killed him making him the third gangland murder victim in 24 hours.
… A reputed mobster, Bruno Carnevale, was shot to death in Queens on Thursday and another man with organized-crime connections, Thomas Edwards, who sometimes used the surname Ernst, was killed later in the day on Staten Island.
… The police found no links between the three killings in the first hours of intense investigations that followed Gallo's death, at 5:30 AM.
… "Somebody either follow him or was given information about where he was," Chief Seedman said. "Then the assassin walked in with just one thing in his mind – to get Gallo."
… With Gallo was his bride of three weeks, the former Sina Essary, whom he had courted after being paroled last March from Ossining State Correctional Facility, where he had served eight years for extortion. Since then he had been seen with Jerry Orbach, the actor, and other show business figures and had let it be known that he was writing his memoirs with Mrs. Orbach.
… The Gallos spent the evening drinking champagne at the Copacabana. Then at 4 AM they drove down to Little Italy in a black 1971 Cadillac plastered with stickers that advertised Americans of Italian Descent.
… With them were burly Diapoulas; his date, Edith Russo of Brooklyn; Mrs. Fiorello, and Mrs. Gallo's daughter by an earlier marriage, Lisa Essary, 10.
… The police and hospital authorities gave this account of what happened next:
… The black Cadillac cruised slowly through the neighborhood, which Chief Seedman said was "definitely not Gallo territory." Then it parked outside the restaurant, which Gallo had never visited before. It stays open until 6 AM.
… The parties sat at two butcher block tables at the rear, near the side door. Gallo and Diapoulas took chairs facing the wall. They drank soda pop and ate what Robert Daley, the deputy police commissioner in charge of press relations, called "Italian delicacies." Mr. Gallo, jolly and relaxed, had just ordered a second helping when the assassin strode silently in the door side door.
… He was about 5'8" tall, witnesses said, and had black hair, with a bald spot in the front. He wore a light tweed car coat, and a 38 caliber pistol was in his hand.
… Women screamed and customers hit the floor as he started shooting. The bodyguard and at least one unknown man who was seated at the bar returned the fire. All told, the police said, four guns were involved and 20 bullets were fired.
… Mortally wounded, Gallo staggered out the front door as the killer kept firing after him, shooting out the front-door transom. Then the killer fled out the back door, chased by the unknown man, who also kept on shooting.
… The killer hopped into a waiting car, probably with an accomplice at the wheel, and escaped through the darkness.
… Gallo collapsed and died in the middle of Hester Street, near his Cadillac, while Diapoulas stood by him and Mrs. Fiorello wept and screamed.
… Policeman in the squad car on Mott Street heard the screams, picked up Gallo's body and the bodyguard and sped to the hospital, with the women in the Gallo party following.
… There attendants stripped of off Gallo's pinstripe suit and placed his slender, lightly muscled body on a device called a cardiac resuscitation cart. In an effort to revive him, they switched on a mechanical plunger and pump Gallo's heart.
… Meanwhile, Diapoulas refused to give any details of the assassination while his wound was being dressed. He told attendants, "I don't want to give you a hard time, but I'm not going to give you information." He declined to say where the shooting took place – or even to give his name.
… Mrs. Fiorello wept hysterically and said: they shot my brother. He was a very good man, a kind man."
… She wore an ankle-length jersey dress, as did Miss Russo and Mrs. Gallo. The sleepy child put Gallo's gray fedora on her head.
… The police mounted a guard over Gallo's body until it was taken out of the hospital, and detectives swarmed in to question the grieving women. Mrs. Fiorello was put under sedation and sent home later in the morning.
… Little Italy was in an uproar. Witnesses reported seeing the gleam of pistols at tenement windows, and the police blocked off Mulberry Street before Chief Seedman arrived on the scene.
… Mr. Seedman said his men would question "any people in the Colombo family who've indicated hostility to Gallo."
… He said the investigation of the Colombo shooting last summer had been making progress, but he added, "I couldn't rush that investigation just because of this occurrence."
… Just after the Colombo shooting, high police officials indicated that arrest would be made soon, but there have been none so far.
… With Chief Seedman was Deputy Commissioner Daley. He stood shivering in the icy drizzle and murmured: "he made a mistake, crazy Joe did. He should've gone to bed last night."
… Down Mulberry Street, Sal Lapolla, a liquor store owner, was philosophical about Gallo's death. "These people, it's their choice," he said. "It's their life they lead. It's not our kind of life."
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The New York Times, May 19, 1968

LARRY GALLO DIES IN SLEEP AT 41; FOUGHT IN BROOKLYN GANG WAR

… Lawrence (Larry) Gallo, one of the Gallo Brothers gang that bitterly fought another Brooklyn Mafia faction, led by the late Joseph Profaci, died in his sleep early Friday.
… The 41-year-old gangster had suffered from cancer. He died in Nassau Hospital, Mineola, Long Island.
… Larry Gallo and his two brothers, Albert (Kid Blast) Gallo and Joseph (Crazy Joe) Gallo were underlings in Profacia's Mafia family prior to the 1960's.
… They were ambitious, however. Surrounding themselves with a group of tough, young adherents, the Gallos declared war on the Profaci elements.
… Their goal was the illegal profits from gambling, the policy racket and loan-sharking, as well as the underworld control of vending machines, pinball machines and the jukebox business..
… For five years the internccine battle went on in various sections of the city, but mostly in Brooklyn. At least 12 members of the two factions (mostly members of the Gallo gang) were killed.
… The war ended in 1965 when another Cosa Nostra leader, Joseph Colombo, took over the Profaci gang and arranged a settlement.
… One of the Gallo's close calls occurred when he was set up as the victim of a gangland assassination plot in a bar in Flatbush. Two men tied a manila rope around his neck and proceeded to throttle him. The timely arrival of a policeman, who was shot in the face by the fleeing assailants, saved Gallo from strangulation.
… He is survived by his widow, Gloria, as well as his two brothers. Joseph Gallo is now in Greenhaven State Prison, serving up to 15 years for extortion.
… Lawrence Gallo lived at 3206 Hewlett Ave., Merrick, Long Island. The body is at Prospero funeral home at 2444 86th St., Bensonhurst, Brooklyn.
A Requiem high mass will be offered at 9:30 AM Tuesday in the St. Rose of Lima's Roman Catholic Church, Parksville Avenue and Ocean Pkwy., Brooklyn. Burial will be in St. Charles Cemetery, Farmingdale, Long Island.

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