Joe Valachi "Mafia's code of silence" - Mafia's Greatest Hits

[Music] w [Music] [Music] Joe vachi Hitman for the mob and the first man to break omera the mafia's Code of Silence vachi was the first to give the world the phrase La cosanostra vachi was the first to reveal the names of the bosses and their soldiers [Music] he explained the mafia's structure their rituals and secrets it was the first time anyone could pull back the curtain or paint the canvas of what it was like fi was the first to expose their bloody history of killings and executions I knew where the bodies were she liveed by the gun and Bu The Knife and you die by the gun and by the knife vachi was the first to blow the lid on a secret Empire worth $40 billion a [Music] year and his Revelations would change the nature of the battle between the FBI and the mafia forever [Music] in 1962 58-year-old Joe vachi was serving 15 years in Atlanta State Penitentiary for heroin [Music] trafficking and inside with him was his mafia boss of 30 years Don Vito geneves head of one of the most powerful crime families in America Joe went back a long time with veto he was in one of veto's Crews so they knew each other very well and he always thought he was in veto's good graces but veto was a homicidal maniac one day veto genvis arranged for vachi to be his cellmate geneves could do this because he controlled the prison wings with fear and intimidation [Music] vachi guessed something was up and had good reason to be nervous geneves believed that vachi had put him in prison after squealing to the Federal Bureau of Narcotics one night genev turned to his cellmate you know we take a battle of apples and in this barrel of apples there might be a bad apple well this Apple has to be removed and if it ain't removed it would hurt the rest of the [Music] apples then geneves walked over to vachi and kissed him on the cheek it was the mafia's kiss of death [Music] to let vachi know he was the Apple to be removed Joe vachi who knew what this meant it meant he was now going to be killed one way or the other beo was out to get him consumed with fear vachi saw Hitman everywhere on the morning of June the 22nd 1962 he was out in the yard when he saw three prisoners coming towards him thinking they had been sent by geneves to kill him he picked up an iron pipe left by construction workers and braced himself for the attack then another inmate approached him vachi swung into [Music] [Music] action Fat's victim was John Joseph sa a small time crook with no Mafia [Music] connections vachi had killed the wrong man and he was now facing the death sentence for murder here he is he's trapped there's no way out for him so he sends word to the federal Authority that he's willing to sing Come a canary to save his skin vachi got word to the US justice department that he was willing to talk about the [Music] mafia for Attorney General Robert Kennedy and his staff at the US justice department this was the break they were looking for [Music] since becoming attorney general in 1961 Kennedy had pursued a vigorous attack against organized crime but he had been struggling to penetrate the country's criminal underworld now for the first time in the history of the mafia an Insider was willing to talk so Kennedy offered a deal to vachi he was permitted to plead guilty to a charge of unpremeditated murder and receive a life sentence on the one condition that he would expose his [Music] organization on July the 17th 1962 vachi was secretly taken out of Atlanta prison and flown to Westchester County Jail just outside New [Music] York he was given the cover of Joseph de marona and taken to an isolated [Music] cell FBI agent James P Flynn was sent to interrogate fat and find out what he knew Flynn came in and he he was [Music] tough he told Bachi listen either you tell us what we want to know or you're no value to us and there's no deal [Music] involved the FBI had been picking up the phrase kostra on recent wiretaps and they believed that it referred to the ma the organization or the outfit but they weren't [Music] sure to get vachi to loosen his tongue he played a trick on him Flynn bluffed Bachi he said what you know we know all about [Music] kostra thinking the FBI had a deeper knowledge of the mafia than they actually did vachi began to talk and he for the first time revealed what it really [Music] meant the meant our thing [Music] kostra and he told Flynn we never call ourselves Mafia Flynn started to pump for for names dates and information the FBI only knew the tip of the mafia Iceberg they really didn't had never really penetrated the organization now the floodgates opened but fi gave them for the first time knowing he had to produce otherwise he was going to stay in prison for the rest of his life he had to produce an inside story really pull pull the curtain back paint the canvas of what it was like to be a mafia soldier in the trenches so for the first time he started spilling the be vachi began to reveal the organizational structure of the mafia based on his information flnr charts to illustrate how the kostra is divided into family units [Music] each with a boss an under boss and left tenants and soldiers beneath [Music] them it seemed to the FBI and everybody else that he was a Rosetta Stone he was telling them the secrets the hieroglyphics were now exposed vachi told Flynn that these mafia families extended Across America from Boston to San Francisco and for the first time the FBI got a picture of the mafia's enormous scope and [Music] activities for the next 3 months from the end of September 1962 Flynn interrogated vachi for 4 days a week [Music] an average session would last about 3 hours and then vachi would become irritated and difficult to [Music] handle Flynn realized that Fat's main fear was that he could never Escape veto [Music] geneves scarcely a day went by without some reference to his former boss at times vachi would lose courage altogether thinking he was going to [Music] die what good is it that I'm telling you nobody will listen nobody will believe you know what I mean this kostra it's like a second government it's too big I'm a dead man already and I know [Music] it vachi was right to be worried according to FBI sources members of the geneves crime family were looking for vachi from his cell veto geneves had put a price tag of $100,000 on vachi and now the mob had traced him to the New York area the FBI fearful that the mafia would get to their prize witness moved vachi again this time to the high security army base at Fort mouth in New [Music] Jersey by the spring of 1963 vachi wanted to go public and was Keen to expose the powerful criminal organization that he blamed for ruining his [Music] life Bobby Kennedy became aware of his potential as a person who could publicize how big and how important the mafia was but Kennedy had huge concerns about vat's [Music] credibility for the past 30 years he'd been a ruthless Mafia Hitman according to the justice department he had at least 33 murders under his [Applause] belt and was also now singing for his life how could anyone be sure that vachi was telling the truth so the FBI decided to use it to test his credit ability Flynn had gathered material for the New York City Police during his interrogation of [Music] vachi the police department had struggled with 30 years of unsolved murder cases dating back to the mafia gang wars and the subsequent KOST power struggle using vat's account as a guide the intelligence unit searched the Department's files in a Precinct by Precinct [Music] operation checking the scattered and unconfirmed facts against his detailed [Music] information they found that valachi's version of the gang slave and killings including the dates locations and the circumstances could all be [Music] verified with the FBI now convinced that vachi could be relied on they got him ready to [Music] testify in September 1963 vachi was flown to Washington to face an investigating senate committee on organized crime Across [Music] America over 2 weeks and October he would appear as the star witness giving firsthand accounts of Life as a mafia Hitman the hearings were broadcast across the country and became a national event right here [Music] pleas the United States is a new country we don't have mythology the way older countries had we had Cowboys and Indians and we had racketeers this was a way for people within the country to look at all those movies that they had seen before about the underworld and put it all [Music] together I think the public was fascinated [Music] by the nation's underworld gets the unwelcome Spotlight of publicity as the Senate's investigation subcommittee begins new hearings on crime Arkansas Senator mcland is at the helm Attorney General Robert Kennedy paints a grim picture of the rise of lawlessness under the kosa Nostra or Mafia this he describes as the government of organized gambling narcotics pedling extortion racketeering and controlling of certain trade unions he says the income runs into [Music] billions well gentlemen as you know we have brought to Queens County this morning the witness Jo vachi uh we are determined to expose every facet of uh his testimony and to pursue this thing as far as we possibly can what was his demeanor uh during your conversation inside over copy uh apparently he's a willing witness and he's anxious to get these things off his chest and uh we had no difficulty with him at all did he seem worried at all I wouldn't say he was worried I think the man is naturally under all of the circumstances uh nervous and a bit upset uh but beyond that he's a good witness Mr Conor don't you get the feeling that he's rather enjoying all this uh I would make no comment but as the hearings got underway vachi was asked why he had murdered another inmate in Atlanta prison why did you decide to kill him at that time at that spot because he's the guy at spotted at that time he was the in other words I I felt that was my last day in plain English uh Senator I felt that was my last day last day thought it was your last day that I that I would be alive what did you feel that you could get all of them before they could get you just uh probably I don't know what I would have done if I don't see him see I can't answer what I would have done in other words you felt helpless and surrounded and you decided to strike when you could if I when I when I saw him yeah you thought that if you if you kill this man who you thought was going to kill you anyway that this I got some satisfaction sent put it you got some satisfaction despite all the ratas surrounding this public event valachi's testimony was a stark reminder that he was a coldblooded [Music] killer then valachi's interrogation really began when did you become a member of this organization 1930 1930 what is the name of it it is cause an ustra in Italian cause an ustra in Italian our our thing and our family in English our saying and our family in [Music] English vachi then revealed how he came to join the mafia [Music] vachi took the committee back to his lowlife roots in the slums of New York in the early 1900s his parents were from Naples and they had 17 children only six survived by the time he was 18 he was the driver with a notorious gang called the Minute Men they robbed hundreds of clothes clothing and jewelry stores between 1919 and 1923 smashing shop windows and grabbing whatever they could before the cops came but one day they were caught and vachi was sent to the infamous Sing Sing prison on the Hudson River in sing sing the 21-year-old vachi made friends with a gangster named alesandro Valero it was then that vachi first learned about a secret organization that he would soon know as laosan Nostra and vachi wanted to be a part of it [Music] now we talk about myself now I a chauffer which I've been known through the years that I was a good driver in fact in fact other Ms used to try and Bor me which I never wanted a go vachi explained to the senate committee how he became a driver for one of New York's top Mafia gangs led by Sicilian born Salvatore Marzano it was 1929 and marenzana was locked in a bloody power struggle with his rival jepi Masia vachi made it known to Marzano that he wanted in and as a test he was sent as the driver on a contract to murder one of masseria's top henchmen [Music] after the hit vachi got the call he was going to be a maid man or a soldier in the mafia vachi then revealed to the committee the rituals of his initiation ceremony into the mob fi described how he was driven to a country house about 90 mi from New York vachi said he was asked to join 30 other members around a [Music] table his boss Don salvator maranzano was going to conduct the initiation he told him how you got inducted Oma the whole code that once you became a member you could never leave how you had to either become an earner or be a Hitman kill somebody before he could even be qualified to be an inductee [Music] [Applause] vachi then revealed to the senate committee the secrets of the mafia's blood and fire initiation ceremony into the [Music] mob well he had the knife and a gun on the table he went on to explain that you live by the gun and by the knife and you died by the gun and by the knife did you you have a full understanding of what that meant at the time yes I did it meant that you was what well expect to die by the gun and by the knife other words when you took that oath you expected someday to die either by the gun or by the knife right that's what you were dedicating yourself to right fi went on to explain that he was told to make a cup with his hands paper was placed inside and set a light [Music] he was then asked to Move It from side to side and told that he would burn like the paper if he betrayed the secrets of the [Music] kostra vachi was then introduced to his gomar his Godfather Joe banano who would be his guide and Mentor bonano asked vachi for his trigger finger and pricked it with his tie [Music] pin he then pricked his own and placed it against Fat's maranzano then announced that they are all family [Music] now all right then whatever then they all shake hands everybody gets up and Shake Hands they say a few more ways together which I can recall they also said in Sicilian but did you know what they meant well uh I I actually I never asked what it meant I I never did ask what it meant but it meant like sort of in the style of an organization or you know in that style but I know you don't bother I didn't bother I never did bother you never did what I another the ble would find out what it meant but I had an idea what it meant you had Ana what was your idea tied up oh we're all tied up all together all together all together right right sink together hang together live [Music] together Fat's Revelations explained why this secret organization had managed to remain hidden for so long anyone who squealed would pay the ultimate price fear had preserved the silence for 30 [Music] [Applause] years now vachi had broken that silence [Music] forever San can I can I say something s yes uh that's to what I'm telling you now I need to go no freigh to say nothing else this is what I'm telling you what I'm exposing to you and the press and everybody this is my Doom this is the promise I'm breaking that I no even if I talk I should never talk about this and I'm doing so the Mob Of course was horrified and you know in the past they had been able to reach people in prison and kill them and they thought somehow if they met off at enough money somebody would be willing to try to bump more with jev's contract of $100,000 hanging over vat's head there were now real fears of a direct attack on the Senate hearings what can you tell us about this threat J well uh uh over the weekend we received information from the FBI that uh their information was to the effect that uh the bomb would be placed in the room this morning and uh also that there might be one or two or one or several persons here with guns who would attempt to assassinate the witness now what precautions have you taken I don't think we ought to talk about how about Mr V you tell him about it no we didn't well well there was supposedly a report that somebody come try to future put a bomb in here or something where' they get that what do you think about the Yankees and the Dodgers the other day I don't know anything about it how do you feel about it I feel uh I'm in the same position from the beginning don't make I'm hot from the beginning you understand what I mean don't make any [Music] difference most of aachi's testimony was devoted to tracing the hierarchy of the American Mafia vachi explained to the senate committee how the smooth working Mafia organization of today evolved from the warning street gangs and power struggles of the early 1900s vachi took the committee back to a meeting in 1931 when Sicilian boss Salvatore maranzano took control of the New York mafia vachi told how Marzano laid out his grand plan to an audience of 400 [Music] Mobsters that The Gangs of New York would now be organized into five families to control the Burrows of the Bronx Brooklyn Manhattan queens and Staten [Music] Island vachi told how maranzano had declared himself the absolute ruler [Music] he would be the boss of all bosses and if anyone disagreed they would be killed vachi then explained how one man did disagree and he revealed how Charles Lucky luchiano had Marzano executed luchano then introduced a more democratic form of leadership he eliminated the Boss Of All Bosses and created the commission effectively a board of directors to resolve Mafia disputes and this led to an Era of Peace cooperation and [Music] prosperity vachi then named the present leaders of the five New York [Music] families Vito genvis Carlo Gambino jeppi Mago Joseph Bano and Jano lucazi these are the men vachi told the committee who run a huge web of organized crime in the city involving gambling prostitution lone shocking narcotics and the infiltration of the mafia into legitimate [Music] businesses and about how many soldiers would usually be under a boss well uh V gen Vis has about 450 4 in and around that about 450 could be even 500 vachi then revealed the names of over 130 members of the geneves crime family and identified members of all the other New York families claiming to know 289 mafiosi all was laid out for the committee on five huge family charts I think what the lot she did was explain what the FBI had and didn't know they had frequently people in the mob and in other areas of criminal activity know others by nicknames um they may know their faces and U but they don't know their actual names to the extent that we now had law enforcement had their actual names we probably learned that for the first time but other than that um I think vat's testimony pretty much stands on its own I mean and it has been proven accurate over time those that you have been able to identify in the five fames you have Mark with stars up on these charts yes the others that are not on the chart you know them by alenes and you didn't know their other names right and therefore you didn't undertake to name them right except that you could give their real name along with their alens right very well he was the one who exposed it all the families the names of the people the levels of uh Authority starting with the Ki to the soldiers but there were some critics skeptical of valachi's testimonies believing that as a foot soldier he wouldn't have been privileged to any information relating to C nostr Inner Circle I think it is a mistake to think of a soldier as being a low-level figure um they're not they are serious people within the mob the only people above a soldier in a direct line of authority is the cappo and the boss [Music] so the soldier is a person high up in the mob by the very nature of being admitted to the Mob they are given mob Secrets they are told about what has occurred they need to know who other people are within the mob because they're free to cross anybody who's outside the mob but no one who's in the mob and so they tend to know a great [Music] deal valachi used his testimony to get back at [Music] geneves I think you might at this time I Gras just a moment to tell how much power how much Authority the BS like Genies has over the family over the soldier members like you Senator I happen to know Fido's [Music] power he not only has the power in our family he also controls the power in gabina family and the L A family in other words his his word becomes LW that makes it right can he and does he pass out death sentences well he passes them out then they tell you what well he was a rat he was this they tell you anything they want to tell you he passes them out you know you know that of your own knowledge that is for sure Fat's testimony was a gold mine he confirmed kostra was the mafia he revealed the names of the bosses and their soldiers he explained their structure their rituals and secrets he exposed their bloody history above all Fat's testimony gave the FBI the targets and led to a change in priority by 1963 the FBI's New York office had increased the number of its agents specializing in organized crime from four to 140 the following year the FBI used hidden microphones to record Teamster's Union boss Jimmy Hofer in a series of exchanges with the Detroit Mafia he was jailed for 8 [Music] years for the FBI electronic surveillance was the future for cracking down on organized [Music] crime I remember as a young agent as a young organized crime agent in the early 1970s all over the country we did wir Taps of the interstate gambling operation that flourished and were controlled by the [Music] mafia we made thousands of arrests and broke up hundreds of large gambling combines in an effort to choke off the flow one of their great sources of money thanks to vat's Revelations the FBI's campaign against the mafia progressed to a new level critically for Attorney General Robert Kennedy it was just the beginning the disclosures of Joseph vachi and of others with knowledge of criminal operations in various parts of the country have helped to give us unprecedented understanding of how these operations [Music] work vachi was the first really important Cog in bringing down and destroying or at least wounding the mo in America without him it might have taken another 15 20 years because there were no defectives even though he was low ranking he still knew enough to sensationalize his story and to get the public really alerted and warned about the threat of the [Music] mafia as for joov valachi he was returned to the relative comfort of the District of Columbia jail in Washington where he had been kept during the [Music] hearings Robert Kennedy ever shrewd believed vachi had a lot more to [Music] offer Bobby Kennedy realized that there was a gold mine [Music] so what he did was said why don't you write your Memoir everything you can remember about the mafia over 13 months vachi painstakingly produced more than 300,000 words on notepads from his cell in Washington he had been there from the very beginning of the modern Mafia and it was a unique day-by-day portrayal over a 30-year period of his life as a hitman [Music] but for someone who had very little schooling Fat's Memoir was no literary Masterpiece it's unprintable it's unpublishable it's unreadable probably Kennedy called for a ghost writer the justice department got a writer Peter Mass to sit down use the Memoir and also discuss uh Bach's life with him this was to form a book which the justice department hoped would encourage other informers to come forward during this period the department started making plans to reward vachi for his cooperation and were even thinking of sending him somewhere to relax in the Sun [Music] Bobby Kennedy had some wild scheme that maybe he could find a girlfriend or bring valachi's wife and put him on some desert island where he could live out the rest of his life but that was impossible and he still had a sentence from murdering that fellow convict the wrong man but killing the wrong man wasn't the only thing stopping him going to a desert island the Italian-American newspaper IL Progresso had got hold of vat's manuscript and was outraged it printed a virent editorial against the forthcoming book saying it was perpetuating the kind of image of criminality associated with the many Italian names in valachi's testimony this snowbo into a massive Surge from pressure groups proclaiming it would slur all Italian Americans their campaign was successful the White House stepped in and halted its publication overnight everything changed for vachi he was told the whole thing was off and was hauled out of his Washington comfort zone and transported back into the harsh federal prison system [Music] he was placed in a small cold cell in Michigan where he was to spend the rest of his sentence in solitary confinement vachi [Music] despaired on the morning of April the 11th 1966 he took the mains lead from his radio and stepped into a shower cubicle [Music] the showerhead was enabled to hold valachi's weight and he was found collapsed and barely alive on the floor by a guard soon afterwards the justice department realized that they had to look after their prize witness better they took him out of the unpleasant Northern prisons they sent him to what they considered uh the best place for him place called Luna near the Mexican border in Texas and they gave him a suite where he had a kitchenet and he had a better more comfortable bed they try to make life as convenient and comfortable as [Music] possible whenever the justice department now gets a real topnotch Defector they send him to what is called the Vach Suite in 196 68 and 5 years after he had given away the mafia's secrets to the world vachi finally got to read the book based on his life it was called the vache papers and it became a bestseller vachi never received a penny from it the book was turned into a feature film in 1972 vachi was played by Charles Bronson the real Joe valachi died of a heart attack in 1971 at latuna Federal Correctional Institution in Texas he outlived his mafia boss veto geneves by 2 years the $100,000 Bounty placed on vat's head by geneves was never collected [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause]

Channel: Best Documentary

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Keywords: documentary, dokumentarfilm, documental, documentario, english documentary, gangster, mafia, biography, crime, documentaire, mafieux

Id: QDA2ygk5luY

Length: 48min 17sec (2897 seconds)

Published: Fri May 31 2024