The Bonanno crime family’s Italian-American members and its Sicilian faction operated in notably different social environments, a distinction rooted in cultural traditions and generational experience. Former Bonanno associate Frank Fiodelino, who grew up around the family with two uncles serving as captains, explained that the American-born faction gravitated toward veterans clubsand social clubs. These venues, often tied to members who had served in World War II, Korea, or Vietnam,functioned as exclusive gathering spots. Access was strictly controlled, and surveillance footage of that era typically showed lookouts vetting anyone who approached the door.
The Sicilian faction, by contrast, operated through neighborhood coffee shops, particularly in Bushwick, Ridgewood,and later Glendale and Middle Village. These establishments appeared more welcoming to the public, with customers able to walk in for coffee or watch a soccer game up front. But behind a door marked “members only,” card games and higher-stakes gambling took place. out back.
Fiodelino described the pre-Galante era inthe late 1970s as grimmer, with smokier, run-down interiors compared to what came later. Even so, the coffee shops were discreet up to a point, he said, with regulars knowing exactly what was happening behind closed doors. Fiodelino worked during the early days of Café Gioninni, which opened around 1989 or 1990 when he was 19 or 20. It stood out as one of the neighborhood’s fanciest spots, complete with marble and a $15,000 espresso machine featuring a large eagle.
The café featured two rooms, a snooker table, card games,and a downstairs area reserved for high-stakes play. The front room, with small tables anda television for soccer broadcasts, was open to the public. Fiodelino recalled watching the 1994 World Cup there. In those years, video poker machines ruled the back rooms.
The café had public closing hours around 11:30 p. m. or midnight, but card games could run around the clock. If someone knocked late, a worker would check who it was before allowing entry.
Higher-stakes games often moved downstairs, where serious discussions also took place. Fiodelino noted that when unknown men arrived to talk, it signaled they were connected to someone important, even if younger associates did not recognize them. The term“Gioninni crew” was not something the group called itself. Fiodelino said the label came from journalist Jerry Capeci and stuck after a 1996 indictment charged16 young associates who gathered at the café.
He still does not know who Gioninni actually was, nor does he believe the person who named the place did either. Although the café was owned by a known mobster, Vito Gazzo, often linked to the crew, was not a prominent presence there. Gazzo would stop in briefly, stay no more than30 minutes, have coffee,and leave. He did not gamble, so he had little reason to linger.
Fiodelino stressed that Gazzo was very low-key and did not act as a leader when he visited. . Afterward, Fiodelino became part of Amida Grimaldi’s crew. Grimaldi had two coffee shops run by others on his behalf, including one on Cypress Avenue near the Bushwick border.
That smaller, older-looking spot was highly profitable, making significant weekly money from just three or four video poker machines, the legal limit at the time. Fiodelino would meet there with Grimaldi’s son and another associate, using it as a base for their clique. These cafés, he said, were staples of the community—places where people gambled, met, and sometimes were killed, despite rules against carrying weapons inside. The Italian-American social clubs included Toyland, closely associated with Joseph Massino.
Fiodelino said that was before his time, since Massino went away in1986. He didvaguely recall another club on Grand Avenue near a Key Food store, which he visited only once for a Christmas party around1990 or1991. At that gathering, Salvatore D’Aleo was running the family, and attendees stood inline to hand him envelopes. Fiodelino attended with his brothers, his uncle Frank DeBara, and DeBara’s sons, some of whom are made members today.
DeBara and Fiodelino’s other uncle, John Forlinano, ran coffee shops on Knickerbocker Avenue dating back decades. Forlinano, who married the sister of Santo “Tony” Giordano, started a lucrative baccarat game inthe1960s that continued running until Fiodelino’s arrest in2002. The café culture on Knickerbocker Avenue stretched back to the Sicilian arrivals of the1940s and ’50s, according to Fiodelino. When Massino took control, he reportedly saw social clubs as magnets for law enforcement, vulnerable to bugs and surveillance, and advised people to avoid gathering there.
However, Fiodelino said Massino did not target the coffee shops, which kept operating. Instead, Massino directed people to his own restaurant, Casablanca, opening around1995 or1996, where he encouraged members to eat and spend money. Fiodelino acknowledged the apparent contradiction of warning against socializing with known criminals at clubs while inviting them to his business, but concluded simply,“Money’s king,”and that was what Massino was about.