Mobsters joe profaci biography

By David Amoruso for Gangsters Inc.

Giuseppe Profaci was one of the five original New York mob bosses, leading what would become known later as the Colombo crime family of La Cosa Nostra. His tenure spanned several decades and countless violent incidents, including a Mafia uprising within his own family.

Born in the Sicilian village of Villabate on October 2, 1897, Profaci quickly took to a life of crime. According to mob historian Thomas Hunt, Profaci was sent to prison late in 1920 after he was found guilty of “forgery with intent to defraud.” His family was involved with the Villabete Cosa Nostra clan.

Once he got out from prison, Profaci decided to try his luck in the country of endless opportunities: The United States of America. He arrived in New York City in 1921 and eventually settled in Chicago. After several years in which he ran a grocery store and bakery, he decided to return to New York. Back in the Big Apple, he began an olive oil import business.

He also got involved with the city’s criminal element, specifically the Sicilian gangsters in Brooklyn, a borrow where relatives of the Magliocco clan were already well-established. Within a very short period of just three years since returning to New York, Profaci emerged as a leader while other powerful Mafia figures in Brooklyn were murdered.

His promotion as boss notwithstanding, these were violent and uncertain times for New York’s Italian mobsters as two bosses fought to control it all. In 1930, Salvatore Maranzano and Giuseppe Masseria turned the city into a warzone in what became known as the Castellammarese War.

While all the smaller families had to choose sides and pick up guns, Profaci took on a different role. According to Joseph Bonanno, who was a close friend of Profaci and himself a Mafia boss, “Profaci’s sympathies were with the Castellammarese [led by Maranzano], but his Family would never take part in the war directly,” Bonanno wrote in his autobiography. “Maranzano

One of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City, US

Criminal organization

The Colombo crime family (, Italian pronunciation:[koˈlombo]) is an Italian-AmericanMafiacrime family and the youngest of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City within the criminal organization known as the American Mafia. It was during Lucky Luciano's organization of the American Mafia after the Castellammarese War, following the assassinations of "Joe the Boss" Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano, that the gang run by Joseph Profaci became recognized as the Profaci crime family.

The family traces its roots to a bootlegging gang formed by Profaci in 1928. Profaci would rule his family without interruption or challenge until the late 1950s. The family has been torn by three internal wars. The first war took place during the late 1950s, when caporegimeJoe Gallo revolted against Profa

Giuseppe "Joe" Profaci (; October 2, 1897 – June 6, 1962) was an Italian-American Cosa Nostra boss who was the founder of what became the Colombo crime family of New York City. Established in 1928, this was the last of the Five Families to be organized. He was the family's boss for over three decades. Giuseppe Profaci was born in Villabate, in the Province of Palermo, Sicily, on October 2, 1897. In 1920, Profaci spent one year in prison in Palermo on theft charges. Profaci's sons were Frank Profaci and John Profaci Sr. Frank eventually joined the Profaci crime family while John Sr. followed legitimate pursuits. Two of Profaci's daughters married the sons of Detroit Partnership mobsters William Tocco and Joseph Zerilli. Profaci's brother was Salvatore Profaci, who served as his consigliere for years, and is known to have been heavily into dealing of pornographic materials. One of Profaci's brothers-in-law was Joseph Magliocco, who would eventually become Profaci's underboss. Profaci's niece Rosalie Profaci was married to Salvatore Bonanno, the son of Bonanno crime family boss Joseph Bonanno. Profaci was the uncle of Salvatore Profaci Jr., also a member of the Profaci crime family. Rosalie Profaci offered the following description of her uncle: He was a flamboyant man who smoked big cigars, drove big black Cadillacs, and did things like buy tickets to a Broadway play for us cousins. But he didn't buy two or three or even four seats, he bought a whole row. Released from prison in 1921, Profaci emigrated to the United States, arriving in New York City on September 4. Profaci settled in Chicago, where he opened a grocery store and bakery. However, the business was unsuccessful, and in 1925, Profaci relocated to New York, where he entered the olive oil import business. On September 27, 1927, Profaci became a United Stat

Joe Profaci owed his success to a network of so-called “cousins” from the old country.

Giuseppe Profaci was one of the original bosses on Luciano’s Commission: the founder of what is now called the Colombo crime family. He was born into a mobile and Mafia-affiliated family in Villabate, Sicily, in 1897. Despite his relative privilege—the combination of wealth and Mafia ties should have shielded him from indictment, much less prison—he was already a felon by the time he emigrated, just before his 24th birthday.

Giuseppe was born in Villabate, in the province of Palermo, Sicily on 2 October 1897, to Salvatore Proface (the name is spelled both ways) and Rosalia Schillaci. His father was a successful carter-turned-merchant, launching the family into professional social circles in Villabate and in the towns where Salvatore did business. He introduced his son to people in several villages in Palermo and Agrigento who would support him in his career, decades later in the United States.

In 1921, on his first trip to the US, Giuseppe named a cousin, Calogero Profaci on Elizabeth Street, in New York City’s Little Italy, as his destination contact. On his second trip, in 1925, he met another cousin, Giuseppe Provenzano, in Chicago’s Little Sicily. A common name, but Provenzano filed naturalization papers from the same address on Cambridge Avenue where Profaci met him, confirming his identity. They are unlikely to be close kin, because Provenzano, his parents, and grandparents were all from Burgio, in the province of Agrigento, while Profaci, his parents, and grandparents lived in Villabate, and there are no common surnames among their ancestors.

In Brooklyn, following his second trip to the US, Profaci became associated with a distant relative from Villabate, Joseph Magliocco, who became his underboss and brother-in-law. (How distant? They are not second cousins or closer. They may be quote-unquote “cousins.”) Magliocco is widely reported to be from Misilm