Bobby Boriello

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Bobby Boriello
Born	Bartholomew Boriello March 31, 1944 Mobster
Allegiance	Gambino crime family

Bartholomew "Bobby" Boriello (March 31, 1944 – April 13, 1991) was an American mobster who belonged to the Gambino crime family and served as boss John Gotti's favorite bodyguard and chauffeur.^[1][2] A prominent hitman during the 1980s, Boriello participated in the 1990 murder of Gambino soldier Louis DiBono.

Early years

Boriello grew up in South Brooklyn, New York, surrounded by mobsters from the Gambino, Genovese, and Colombo crime families. His younger brother Stevie was a close friend of neighborhood gangsters Joseph "Crazy Joe" Gallo, Albert Gallo and Frank Illiano, and after Joey's murder, Stevie was instrumental in securing the crew's South Brooklyn rackets. A burly, 6-foot, 3-inch man, Boriello was a feared enforcer for the Gallo gang.

Gambino crime family

Between 1967 and 1972, Boriello was arrested six times, on charges of weapons possession, assault, larceny and gambling.^[2]

In the 1980s, Boriello became a

, a paraplegic gangster involved in loan sharking and gambling in the neighborhood who was killed January 23, 1998.

During his early days, Boriello was suspected in several gangland slayings, as well as involvement in extortion, loan sharking and drug trafficking.

Making ceremony

Former Gambino capo

.

Junior Gotti crew

After John Gotti promoted his son to capo at the behest of Sammy Gravano, and gave him his own crew, Gotti assigned Bobby Boriello to the Junior Gotti crew. Other crew soldiers included John "Jackie" Cavallo, Charles Carneglia, Thomas "Tommy Twitch" Cacciopoli, and later on the crew included Dominic "Fat Dom" Borghese, Vincent "Vinnie Butch" Corrao, Carmine Agnello, and Craig DePalma. The crew's associates included Steve Kaplan, Frank Lividisi, Michael McLaughlin, David Pietras, Jeff and Steve Dobies, Giovanni Tartaglia, John Ruggiero, John Alite, Louis Casaneti.

Boriello's business dealings were conducted in Manhattan, Queens, Staten Island, and throughout Brooklyn, especially South Brooklyn, where he associated with Gambino family wiseguys Angelo Paccione, Anthony "Toddo" Anastasio, Joseph Chirico, Anthony "Sonny" Ciccone, and many others, with interests in trucking, construction, and loan sharking.

Steven Kaplan was paying Boriello and Junior Gotti tribute for his investments in strip clubs up and down the East Coast. In 1987, Boriello crew member and close associate Anthony "Shorty" Mascuzzio from Carroll Gardens was killed in a New York nightclub owned by Kaplan. Low level mob associate David Fisher had been in a physical altercation with Mascuzzio, over a business squabble, and ended up shooting him to death.

Promotion

Boriello, being the most powerful and closest ally to John Gotti in the crew, was appointed acting capo of the Junior Gotti crew. In December 1990, soon after Junior became a capo, his father was indicted and set up a 5-man ruling panel to which Junior was appointed. Boriello operated his rackets from his Brooklyn social club on Sackett Street where he was about to rechange the order of rank of crew members from the club at the time he was killed.

Mob hit

In 1990, Gotti told Boriello to murder Gambino soldier Louis DiBono. DiBono had secured the lucrative contract to install fireproofing foam on the infrastructure of the Twin Towers of the New York

. After DiBono's death, Gravano took over the business.

On another occasion, Boriello unsuccessfully tried to kill Genovese crime family associate Preston Geritano on a Brooklyn street, firing shots at him in public. Since Geritano had relatives in Genovese crime family, Genovese and Gambino representatives met to discuss his fate. Eventually the Gambinos released Geritano to the Genovese with the condition that he be killed if he tried to retaliate against Boriello. In 2004 Geritano's own brother-in-law Andrew Gargiulo stabbed him to death in broad day light.

Assassination

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On April 13, 1991, Boriello was shot to death outside his

. Lastorino shot Boriello twice in the head, and five times in the torso. Boriello died in the street beside his 1991 Lincoln Town Car, outside his home on Bay 29th Street. Borriello's wife, Susan, and their two young children were inside the home at the time of the shooting.

At the time of his murder, Boriello had been under investigation by multiple federal agencies and the Kings County District Attorney's Office for directing a

, fingered Boriello as one of the shooters in the slaying, reasoning that Boriello had been one of the more accomplished "hitters" in the family.

In jail at the time, Gotti ordered Gambino family members to meet with the leaders of the Genovese family after Boriello's assassination. Keeping to their earlier agreement, they agreed to kill Geritano. However, it wasn't until 2004 that Geritano was stabbed to death outside a

, seeking Geritano's execution. John Gotti sent word to Stevie Boriello that he had permission to avenge his brother's death by killing whomever he needed to, and had the backing of Gotti.

Stevie Boriello remained involved with the family after his brother's death, handling loan sharking, gambling, and extortion rackets in Brooklyn and Staten Island, where he currently resides.

In popular culture

• Gotti directed by Kevin Connolly and starring John Travolta
  as Gotti.

See also

• Raab, Selwyn, "Team's Search Goes On For Killers of Castellano", New York Times, June 29, 1986. (Identifying Gene Gotti and Bobby Boriello as prime suspects in the slayings of Paul Castellano and Tommy Bilotti).
• "Informer Identifies Alleged Gunman", Washington Post, September 6, 1986.

References

External links

• John Gotti - The Last Mafia Icon by Allen May
• Last Days of the Gotti Gang - Part Five: Junior’s Trial Intersects ‘Mafia Cops’ Trial by J. R. de Szigethy and Lou Eppolito Jr.
• The Murder of Bobby Boreillo at The Smoking Gun