The Craziest Experience I had in the Mob | Michael Franzese

Michael what was the craziest experience you had because I know your father did 40 years in prison for several of those years at least the first 20 I was very involved in trying to get him out of prison and they said what was the craziest thing that happened to you during that experience it might have been the craziest thing that happened to me while I was on the street and so I want to relay it I'll never forget it [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] hey everyone welcome to another sit down with Michael Francis hope everybody is doing well all is very good very blessed on this end as always I give God all the praise honor glory and Thanksgiving for that yes people I'm very blessed throughout all of the the heartache all the challenges all of the ups and downs I consider myself to be very blessed to be alive and free because it could have worked out a lot differently for me and a quick reminder Chas palmitary and I we have created a new platform called the wise which is Chaz and the wise 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Theater in Miami you know it's attached to the Hyatt Hotel me and Mike Tyson appearing possibly transpometary with us also it's going to be a great night great lineup I guarantee you're going to enjoy it tickets will go fast so jump on there and get them now you know I was recently asked again and I try to respond to what people are asking me what you want to hear Michael what was the craziest experience you had because I know your father did 40 years in prison for several of those years at least the first 20 I was very involved in trying to get him out of prison and they said what was the craziest thing that happened to you during that experience it might have been the craziest thing that happened to me while I was on the street and so I want to relay it I'll never forget it and it was just crazy you never know how you're going to meet people in this world you know is networking important to you I always try to you know remember the people that I meet because you never know you know someday you you know they can come in handy you can be useful to one another in a certain way but I'm always surprised at how I meet people today I was on a conversation a pastor that I know up in Vancouver Canada contacted me and he was recently in Europe and I was told I have a lot of fans there and uh a big base from Sweden contacted me and wants me to come to Sweden to do several events there so we had a great you know call this morning uh just wonderful people enjoyed hearing them and we're planning something for February of next year so if you're in Norway Sweden or Denmark I think I'm going to be coming to your neighborhood so uh watch out for that I'm sure you heard a lot about it but I'm looking forward to it I've been to several places in Europe and and the world but never to Norway Sweden or Denmark the Scandinavian area so I'm looking forward to that but again you know because I know a pastor he recommended me people knew me in another place networking is amazing so let me tell you a networking experience that I had I was 20 years old I was out in Suffolk County Long Island which is you know out east and I had a little place out there called Sonny's Pizza I was in a pizza business way back then I had taken over a place from somebody and I named it after my dad I love my dad right and I'm sitting in a bar next door to the pizza place and I'm sitting with a couple of guys I didn't really know him one of the guys seen him you know once or twice before we came into the bar and I didn't drink at that time but I was sitting we were just talking back and forth and all of a sudden the guy starts talking and he tells me yeah you got to see this girlfriend I got man she's a tough woman and she starts talking like that and I said well what do you mean you know tough and he said well you know she was involved with gangsters I said really yeah and he didn't know who I was by the way so uh I said what kind of gangster she said well you know there was this big bank robbery case and some mob guy got convicted of it and uh you know our husband was one of the witnesses against the mob guy and she was there and you know he starts talking like that this is sounding very familiar my father was convicted of masterminding a nationwide string of bank robberies so I said him what was the guy's name the mob guy and he goes I think it was sunny sunny for Zizi he didn't even know how to pronounce it pronounce the name something like that he sounds Sunny so I said wow okay so I'm listening right coincidence strict coincidence and when we finish the conversation I said can I talk to you for a minute and I brought him in the back of the you know in a room in the back and I said listen I got to meet this woman I said what's her name he said Rusty they called her I said well I got to meet her because her real name was Eleanor Cordero and her husband John Cordero was the major witness against my father drug addict junkie bank robber the whole bit so he says oh no no no you don't understand this woman she'll kill me if anything and she knows that I was talking she's going to kill me and I'll be honest with you I was carrying at that point in time and I took out a piece and I said well you know it's either her or me I said this woman is critical to me my father's doing 50 years for a crime he didn't commit and her husband was the major witness I need to speak to her because she knows the truth that went down so I scared him too and I said all I want is the truth that of her so he said okay okay I'll set it up and then he had another friend and you know we all got together and he said okay I'll set it up so he comes back to me in a day or so and he says look he says you agree to meet you but she's going to meet you late at night in a diner or in a behind a diner she'll be in her car and she wants you and you alone nobody else to come at that point I should okay so I immediately go tell the lawyer I said listen I'm meeting with Eleanor Cordero now let me tell you about this woman my father had been tried for murder if you look up the case Ernie the Hawker Polo was a guy his body came up in the Jamaica Bay tied with cinder blocks and all of that regular mob style head and my father was tried for his murder he was acquitted in the case he was acquitted but she Eleanor was originally married to Ernie the hawkropolo now she after he dies she marries John Cordero who's a junkie and all this kind of stuff you know good choice of of husbands she picks so anyway she'll meet you alone don't come with anybody else great so I go tell the lawyer he says you got to wire yourself up so he's actually the day I was meeting her he's wiring me up you know putting a tape on me and I as we were doing it I just got a bad feeling he said you know what I don't want you to do that let me meet her the first time let me see what this is all about I don't want to put a wire on me okay so it's all set up we go uh it's midnight or close to midnight it was late at night and I drive to the place and she's in the back of the diner in a Mustang right I get out of my car I was alone I walk into her car I sit down she immediately pulls out a gun puts it in my crotch in that area and says if you're wired I'm going to blow your brains out and something else along with it just like that I said hello I'm not wired she patched me down she does the whole bit I said not wired all I want is the truth out of you I want to have a discussion with you so she sits there right straight up and she said your father was framed my husband was the principal witness and I can get your father out of prison I said okay Eleanor that's all I want I don't want you to lie I want you to tell the truth you know I knew exactly what to say at that point even at 20 years old and this started a seven month relationship one I mean relationship is I bet basically had a babysit for her because she told me that night she says listen if my husband finds out about this he'll kill me and if the FBI knows that I'm helping you they'll hurt me I'll be in trouble on both ends so you got to be responsible for my protection and my welfare I said no problem now let me tell you the back story on this her husband John Cordero and her got into an argument at one point this was prior to this and she has said I'm going to blow the whistle on you I'm going to tell everybody that you framed Francis and all of that well they were allegedly in an apartment when this happened and he got so angry with her this is not a you know as a maniac that he took an ax and he started hitting her with an ax an ax now I might have been it so I don't know what kind of accent was but anyway to the point we gave her 2 000 stitches and when you saw her she had Cuts here she had cuts across her face this and that and that while he was uh hitting her with the ax according to her you know and this was documented afterwards we saw him police reports that has actually happened uh he was having sex with her and he was putting tranquilizers in her throat to clot the blood so she wouldn't die this is the kind of maniac now my father would never ever be involved with somebody like this because first of all he hated junkies he preached against drugs to me from the time I was a kid he didn't anything to do with drugs he would never be involved with somebody like this but this is the type of woman he had told her during this encounter that he was going someplace to shop in the ax he was going to come back and chop her up in little pieces while he went out wherever he went to do that she dragged herself to a phone called 911 and the cops got there and they arrested him they let him go because the feds jumped in and got him released he was never charged with that crime you know that's how the feds work when they're protecting somebody and uh and she survived but two thousand stitches you could see it right so I have to protect her so I rent a house I got her there I had to go see her every day I'm bringing her food at the same time I bring it to Newsday a guy by the name of Manny topple who was the reporter and I tell Manny this is what I got a lot of people knew that the case against my father wasn't right that he wouldn't be involved in bank robberies right and it came out later on a lot of people believed that he was framed at the time so I said Manny this is who I got he got very interested in the story but he said Michael before I do anything we got to take her and have a lie detector says they said hey go ahead takes her has a lie detector test she passes everything that she said about my father being framed and remember she drove the getaway car she had a little daughter her daughter was in the back seat that's how these guys were the daughter was in the back seat of the car while they were robbing the bank she was a getaway driver so she knew everything and she passed the lie detector test news day does a whole story on her Manny topple he's passed on now but you can look it up and it's in news day Eleanor Cordero the whole thing about my dad I think it was front page if I'm not mistaken I'm almost positive there might have been one of two articles we take her into court she swears we get an affidavit we we got turned down every single time you know the judge just there was no way they were going to let my father out of jail no matter what forget what the uh the excuse was we got turned down so many times even with her but during this time and and watching her and all of this I'll be honest with you she made me a nervous wreck she was a crazy woman she wanted to get into a relationship with me and all that and I wouldn't do it I said Eleanor we can't do that I said because then it's going to come out on the stand that you had a relationship with me I didn't want to uh you know demean her or insult her in any way but there's no way in the world you know I remember once going to visit my father he said how's it going I said Dad I said not even you are worth me getting into a relationship with her as much as I love you he laughed you know but it was that kind of a horrible woman I just be honest with you you know horrible and um I remember one time I will I'll never forget we were in the house that I rented for her and uh I'm watching the Super Bowl this is how much time I had to spend with her you know between then and the time we were going to court I'm watching the Super Bowl I'm sitting on a chair she comes out in kind of like a negligee night ground or whatever she had on and I pay no attention to her and I'm sitting in the chair and all of a sudden she comes behind me grabs my hair as a knife to my throat and says you know if you're screwing me in any way if you're not being honest with me I'm going to cut your throat and I said Eleanor you know I promise everything is above board what are you talking about you see how well we've been taking care of you she pulls the knife away and people I jumped off that chair I wanted a strangle her I'd be honest with you I caught myself like that was it for me another time you know her little daughter was with her and her daughter asked me to go and take her for quarter I think she was 12 years old should take her for coffee and we come back in the house and she takes a crystal uh um ashtray and curls it at my head where were you with my daughter you know that crazy woman and uh it missed me they would have knocked me out if it hit me in the head but this is the kind of this is the kind of uh abuse I had to take from her just to try to you know get her to go to court and do the right thing and eventually like I said we got turned down but that was you know one of the craziest experiences I ever had and you know I didn't get into it more but she used to call me five times a day she needed this she needed that it was it was tough you know and I'm 20 years old I try to go through this with that one but again you know these trials and tribulations in life they they're valuable later on because if you can deal with something like that you can deal with a lot of differences situations and it certainly prepared me because within a year or two of that I was proposed and became a recruit in that life and had already gone through you know a lot of stuff so I just thought I'd let you know you know people ask me about it somebody asked me specifically what was the craziest thing that happened you know while you were on the street and trying to help your father because I did try to help him a lot man you know we had three different attorneys and you know raising money to pay the attorneys and you know going to the court we went up to Supreme Court on constitutional issues certiorary issues in my dad's case so for the first 20 years or so I was very active in trying to help him out and he kept coming out on parole during that time he did 10 years came out on parole got violated went back for a cup again he kept getting violated for Association so it was a crazy time but listen you know when your family is down you do what you got to do to try to help them so that's it I thought it was an interesting story I hope I answered your question and uh I got a lot more things as they come into my head that we can talk about but that's it for today so how do I always leave you same way be safe please be safe you know again I hate to open up the the paper today online and see what's going on it's crazy stuff New York California yesterday so it's a 10 people beating up some young guy just crazy stuff right out on the street uh be healthy take care of yourself very very important and yes when I say this I mean this God bless every single one of you you your families and thank you so much uh you know for enjoying the content please subscribe to wise and the wise guy and continue to support me we appreciate it very much yes I'll see you next time [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music]

Channel: Michael Franzese

Views: 338,840

Keywords: michael, franzese, michael franzese, mafia, mob, mobster, mob boss, mafia boss, caporegime, colombo, colombo family, colombo mafia, gambino, gambino family, bonanno, bonanno family, lucchese, lucchese family, genovese, genovese family, al capone, john gotti, american mafia, italian mafia, sonny franzese, sitdown with michael franzese, mob movie mondays, mob stories, mob movie review, crazy experience, michael's crazy experience in the mob, michael's craziest mafia experience

Id: Nz1ULkVLu5I

Length: 17min 3sec (1023 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 01 2023