Herbie Blitzstein

Herbie Blitzstein 6,2/10 6304 votes

. 1960 - Marshall Caifano, 87, Chicago: A high-ranking Chicago mobster suspected of committing numerous killings who became the mob's Las Vegas enforcer. Back in the old days, Fat Herbie Blitzstein was a somebody, a man to step aside from, under Tony Spilotro, back in the 1980's when Spilotro and his crew ruled Vegas. Nicky the Ant Spilotro was Chicago representative in Vegas and since Fat Herbie was Tony the Hat's top loan shark, Fat Herbie could do what he wanted to do, say what he wanted to. Thursday, June 12, 1997 9:58 a.m. AT THE FEDERAL courthouse, they're saying Herbie Blitzstein's murder cut short the FBI's probe into the Los Angeles mob's stepped-up activities here. One of them was Herbert Blitzstein. A mountain of a man at six foot, 300 pounds, he was known as “Fat Herbie,” or the “Fat Hebe.” In William Roemer’s “The Enforcer,” he states Blitzstein was one of the mobsters the FBI tested during the early days of the FBI’s Top Hoodlum Program. Born in Chicago, Herbie started working the rackets in the late 1950s. Blitzstein stood at 6 feet and weighed three hundred pounds and sported a goatee and moustache, dressed flamboyantly and drove a 1973 Cadillac Eldorado. It was said he had a close physical resemblance to the Italian opera singer Luciano Pavarotti.

Herbie Blitzstein
Herbie Blitzstein Las Vegas

By Mike Hudson

Gone: Sonny Nicoletti, former
reputed head of the mob in Niagara Falls.

Legit? The late, Joe Todaro, Sr. (Right) former reputed head of the mob in Buffalo with son, Joe Todaro, Jr. (Left). Both became fabulously successful pizza and chicken wing purveyors.

Bobby Panaro, who denies he has any involvement with the Mafia, has been widely rumored to be the new boss of the Buffalo mob.

Mafia man? Did Steve “The Whale” Cino order a hit on the late Herbert “Fat Herbie” Blitzstein?

With the ground covering Joe Todaro and Sonny Nicoletti still fresh, both law enforcement and the legion of mafia buffs who make their home in Western New York have busied themselves trying to figure out who might next head up the tattered remains of the once formidable Magaddino crime family.
I’ve been covering organized crime in Buffalo for the better part of 15 years. There are some great stories, lots of colorful characters and some genuinely decent people who have been negatively affected by this kind of speculation.
Personally, I don’t get it. Because what nobody has been asking is “why anyone would want to be the head of the Buffalo mob?”
Even the most optimistic observers say the old Magaddino outfit has but 20 made guys left at most, and the majority of them have long since qualified for Social Security.
The formerly subservient Utica and Hamilton, Ont., crews have their own problems, with alleged Utica crime lord Russ Carcone still reeling from a 2000 shoplifting bust and the Canadian crew as dead as charity since the assassination of John “Johnny Pops” Papaglia in 1997.
Given all the agita that goes along with being a mob boss in a third-rate American city, is it really worth becoming a target both for law enforcement and any two-bit wannabe punk looking to make a name for himself?
Just ask the highly respected Papaglia, whose storied career ended when he got shot in the back of the head by a bumbling Irish alcoholic named Ken Murdoch who took the contract for just $2,000 and 40 grams of cocaine.
Even Todaro, who the FBI claims was the last official don of the Buffalo family, reportedly gave up his position in 2006 in order to spend more time with his family and enjoy the fruits of the lucrative La Nova pizza business he founded decades earlier.
The leading contender for the top spot, Frank “Butchie Bifocals” BiFulco, was alleged to have been a feared enforcer and a capo in the Magaddino organization going back to the 1960s. But he’s currently indisposed, serving a 10-year, 10-month stretch in Club Fed for the 2001 torching of a leased Nissan in the parking lot of Walden Galleria.
According to the FBI, Leonard “The Calzone” Falzone took over as acting boss of the family when Todaro stepped down in 2006, after years of serving as an enforcer, hit man and finally a capo in the organization. Falzone has of course denied this.
Still, the feds say Falzone was ultimately named consigliere to the Buffalo family in 1987.
Aside from a misdemeanor conviction for possession of stolen property in 1971, Falzone had never been in trouble with the law until the mid-1990s, when a federal investigation of Laborers Local 210 in Buffalo put him in the spotlight. Falzone was then an administrator of the local’s $80 million pension fund, and he became a huge target for the investigators.
At the time, Buffalo crime circles were lousy with paid informants, stool pigeons and squealers of every stripe. And it didn’t take the feds long to put together a case based on the allegations of these disreputable individuals.
The RICO and RICO conspiracy charges set forth in Falzone’s indictment covered a period of time from approximately September, 1985 through August, 1989, during which Falzone was alleged to have engaged in the business of loansharking - charging extremely high interest rates on loaned money.
In 1995, Salvatore 'Sammy' Spano told a federal jury he needed Falzone's protection and approval to establish a loansharking operation in Las Vegas. His testimony was the latest piece in the case federal prosecutors were trying to build against Falzone, who stood accused of being a renowned mob enforcer who escaped numerous investigations without a conviction.
'I asked him (Falzone) if I could move to Vegas and if I could use his name while out in Vegas,' Spano said on the witness stand. Also testifying against Falzone were the contemptible Ron Fino and Ronald 'Ronnie' Raccuia, a degenerate gambler and onetime Buffalo Common Council Chief of Staff.
Falzone was tried in the local media as well. Following his conviction, the Buffalo News editorialists felt vindicated. 'Over the years, Falzone had developed a reputation among some as untouchable,” an unsigned editorial read. “No more. This felony conviction cracks his slick reputation for invincibility.'
The other name currently being batted about as a possible successor to Todaro is that of successful businessman Bobby Panaro, a Las Vegas area resident for the past four decades who spends some time in Buffalo.
Like Falzone, Panaro was also ousted from Laborers Local 210 for allegedly associating with organized crime figures. At age 57, he was sentenced in 1999 by U.S. District Judge Philip Pro to 7-1/2 years in prison for conspiring to extort longtime mob associate Herbert 'Fat Herbie' Blitzstein, who was slain in January 1997.
At the time, Panaro was running an auto dealership known as Good Fellows. 'They're giving me 7 1/2 years,' he told reporters following his conviction. 'For what? What did I do?'
A jury acquitted Panaro of all charges related to the Blitzstein slaying, but the four-week trial left him branded a 'mafia soldier.' 'I'm no mob soldier,' he said. 'I never have been. I never would be.'
Federal prosecutors had accused Panaro and Steve “The Whale” Cino of authorizing the Blitzstein killing as part of a plot to take over the victim's business activities in Las Vegas.
At the trial, prosecutors described Panaro as a member of the Buffalo family and Cino as a member of the Los Angeles mob. 'Because I'm Italian?' Panaro asked. 'Get out of here.'
There are people in law enforcement, perhaps, whose jobs depend on whether or not there is a mafia, a “Cosa Nostra,” organized crime, or whatever you want to call it, in the city of Buffalo, New York.
And there are other people, lots of them, who study mob politics and machinations in the same way that Civil War buffs examine Sherman’s March to the Sea.
But if you ask me, I think Leonard Falzone and Bobby Panaro need to be head of the Buffalo crew like they need another hole in the head.

Niagara Falls Reporter

www.niagarafallsreporter.com

Jan 08 , 2013

Herbie Blitzstein

A Loan Shark's Last Words: Why Me?

IPSN July 16, 1997

Details of Herbie Blitzstein Hit Revealed;
L.A. Mob Stumbles and Falls in Vegas
As the assassin’s bullet ripped through “Fat” Herbie Blitzstein’s body, the dying Chicago loan shark and ex-pal of the late Tony Spilotro looked into his killer’s eyes and wailed: “Why me?” Seconds later he collapsed into a black leather easy chair dead.
The January 6th slaying of Blitzstein at his Las Vegas town home is a tale of intrigue and the incompetence of two inept criminal organizations floundering in the backwaters of Mafia gangland.
Herbie Blitzstein was an influential wise guy living high and mighty in the desert oasis.....but that was 20 years ago. As a lieutenant serving under the late Anthony Spilotro in former days, Blitzstein enjoyed all of the privileges, perks, and protection that go with Chicago mob membership. But after Spilotro and his brother were buried alive in an Indiana cornfield in 1986, his connections to Chicago for the most part, withered.
He continued to run his loan-sharking and insurance fraud scams under the mistaken belief that no-one could possibly be interested in molesting his operations. With Spilotro gone, and the presence of the Chicago mob in Vegas greatly diminished from what it had been during the cheeky days of the 1970s and early 1980s, Herbie probably figured that he would be left alone in old age. After all, he was 63, and no longer a “player” who rolled the dice within the inner mob circles, or so he thought.
Beginning last October, the long dormant Los Angeles mob entered into a conspiracy with the Buffalo group to muscle in on Blitzstein’s operation in Las Vegas.
Present at the meeting were John Branco, an ex-felon out of Los Angeles who was secretly cooperating with the FBI; Carmine Milano, underboss in L.A.; Stephen Cino, and Stephen Caruso, reputed members of the West Coast criminal organization.
Robert Panaro of Buffalo, allegedly represented the interests of the East Coast crime family.
Caruso, Branco, and Milano met in a hotel coffee shop to iron out specific details. It was agreed that Blitzstein would not be killed.
They did not know that Peter Caruso had aleady gone against the wishes of the Milano group in L.A., and had already planned Blitzstein’s demise.
Peter Caruso burglarized Blitzstein’s home a few hours before the actual hit was scheduled to go down. Among the items removed from Blitzstein’s home was jewelry and coins belonging to Teddy Binion, the Las Vegas casino operator who was suspended from his day to day operation of the Horseshoe Club.
After rifling through the home, Caruso left the door open for a pair of hired assassins recruited by mob associate Alfred Mauriello, who received a “finder’s fee” of $10,000 - a portion of the $50,000 in stolen loot removed from Blitzstein’s abode.
Mauriello told the FBI after the caper unraveled, that he hired two hitmen, Richard Friedman, 55, and Antone Davi, 29, to handle the matter for $3,500 - less than the cost of a cheap used car.
Poor Herbie Blitzstein. He was betrayed by his pal and business partner Joe DeLuca who had fronted for Blitzstein in his automotive repair business, according to secret affidavits.
DeLuca wanted a larger share of the business, and met with Panaro, Cino, Branco, and Peter Caruso at a Denny’s Restaurant outside of Las Vegas just two days before the burglary and murder for the purpose of dividing up the spoils.
With Herbie gone, Buffalo and Los Angeles wrangled over the split, but neither group could agree on what was fair with respect to how much each group would receive from the insurance scams being run out of Blitzstein’s car repair business.
The greedy Milanos, who had been torn apart in the mid 1980s through a series of federal prosecutions, at one point, attempted to cut Panaro out of the action.
Informant John Branco, who was held in high regard by the Milanos to the point where he was about to be inducted into the family as a “made” member, was advised by Caruso that plans were afoot to burglarize the home of Teddy Binion, and then murder him. Caruso had just sold Branco a watch and a gold coin belonging to Binion for $1,000 and was eager for more loot.
Teddy Binion is alive and well. Caruso’s plan was foiled, but Binion’s home was sprayed by bullets in a drive by shooting reminiscent of Chicago in the reckless days of the 1920s.
Federal investigators believe that the unauthorized hit of Herbie Blitzstein may spell the final downfall of the informant-riddled Los Angeles mob, once the trials of the 12 men charged in this case have run its course. It will be interesting to see whether or not Las Vegas will continue to remain an open city now that Mafia “amateur hour” is at an end.

Herbie Blitzstein Las Vegas

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