Zips (Mafia)
Zips (also Siggies or Geeps ) is a slang term of the American Cosa Nostra , referring to new immigrants of the Sicilian Cosa Nostra from Italy, due to their hissing and rapid pronunciation of their native dialect.
etymology
The immigrant founders of the American Cosa Nostra were often members of the original Cosa Nostra. Since they often have their typical beard of the time in the form of a Mustache (s: Mustache) as carried in their original home, they were considered Mustache Pete called.
The new criminal immigrants from Sicily also usually did not speak English and spoke to one another in their native Sicilian dialect , which even American mafiosi with language skills could hardly understand, which is why they derogatoryly dubbed the newcomers "Zips" and thus their original, fast and therefore difficult to understand pronunciation - which they only perceived as sibilants - onomatopoeic .
Entry and integration
With increasing pressure to persecute the Mafia and the presence of the government in Italy, many Mafiosi of the Sicilian Cosa Nostra came to the United States for a time and were soon referred to as "Zips" by the US bullies .
The "Zips" were initially extremely effective for the US Mafia, as they were unknown in the USA and no police files had yet been kept on them. They mostly socialized with their own kind and were mostly based on Knickerbocker Avenue in Brooklyn , New York City .
In carrying out their deeds, they had no scruples about murdering police officers, judges, women or children, which was generally considered a taboo for the American mafia .
They were also known for murdering their enemies by bombing them, a typical modus operandi in Sicily that the American mafia tended to shy away from, as the risk of injuring bystanders could be very high.
But despite their ruthlessness, they were tolerated by the American Mafiosi, as they were able to earn US millions of dollars for the "families" - especially the Bonanno family and the Gambino family .
Carmine Galante , boss of the Bonanno family, kept a Sicilian bodyguard of several members and took many "men of honor" from Sicily into his family. Galante believed the Sicilian immigrants were more reliable and capable than the US-born clan members. In addition to the “Zips”, only the Bonanno Capo Cesare “The Tall Guy” Bonventre and Baldassare “Baldo” Amato Galante were personal bodyguards .
Pizza Connection
By working with Galante and supporting other Sicilian mafiosi, the influence and power of the Zips in the New York underworld grew. Eventually, in the 1970s and 1980s, they were able to build a large-scale heroin smuggling ring between the American and Sicilian Mafia - the so-called Pizza Connection - which became a highly profitable business, with the well-organized Sicilian Cosa Nostra every year earned several hundred million dollars and also gained more and more influence in the USA. The Americans viewed this with some unease and fear. Bonanno-Capo Salvatore "Toto" Catalano and Gaetano Badalamenti , who was at times the most powerful Sicilian mafioso , also had a strong stake in this business .
The FBI Special Agent Joseph Pistone alias "Donnie Brasco", who was undercover in the Bonanno family , reported on the ambivalent relationship between the Americans and the Sicilians and described the impressions that the Sicilians left with the simple " soldiers ":
“He said“ Zips ”were initially Sicilians who had been brought into the country to deal with heroin and murder assignments for New York Bonanno boss Carmine“ Lilo ”Galante. They were often housed in pizzerias, where they got heroin delivered and redistributed, laundered money and waited for further orders from Galante. ... he said the "Zips" were a conspiratorial and closed clique. ... They are, he said, the most unscrupulous killers there is in the business. "
Assassination of Galante
Carmine Galante was murdered on July 12, 1979 in front of Joe & Mary's restaurant in Bushwick, Brooklyn, and his bodyguards Bonventre and Baldo Amato are said to have been involved in the attack; in any case, both disappeared from the scene with the masked shooters.
Bonventre was arrested a few weeks later but released. Rumors soon arose that the " Commission " - as the highest body of the US Mafia - had approved the murder of Galante because he did not want to share his profits from the drug business.
Other voices see his murder as preventing the expansion of power by Galante, who possibly wanted to become a capo di tutti i capi with his "zips" and the huge profits in order to rule all other families as head.
Films and documentaries
- 2014: In the Mafia Network - The FBI's Secret Files ; British 13-part documentary series (episode 7: The Drug Baron: Carmine Galante); describes u. a. the relationship between Galante and the Spiš, as well as his murder and the alleged involvement of Cesare Bonventre and Baldassare Amato
literature
- Joseph D. Pistone & Charles Brandt: Donnie Brasco: Unfinished Business ; 2007; ISBN 0-7624-2707-8
- Anthony DeStefano: The Last Godfather: Joey Massino & the Fall of the Bonanno Crime Family ; 2006
- Simon Crittle: The Last Godfather: The Rise and Fall of Joey Massino ; 2006; ISBN 0-425-20939-3
- Selwyn Raap: The Five Families: The Rise, Decline & Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empire ; 2005
- Carl Sifakis: The Mafia Encyclopedia ; 2005; ISBN 0-8160-5694-3
- Robert J. Kelly: Encyclopedia of Organized Crime in the United States ; 2000; ISBN 0-313-30653-2
- Joseph D. Pistone & Richard Woodley: Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia ; 1999; ISBN 0-340-66637-4 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Claire Sterling: The Mafia. Scherz Verlag, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-502-17700-7 .