Infamous America - THE ICEMAN Ep. 3 | “The Galante Assassination”

Episode Date: May 31, 2023

Richard Kuklinski’s reputation as a professional killer grows when he takes centerstage in a shootout in Harlem, but the experience causes him to search for quieter, easier ways to fulfill his contract murders. He learns the value of poison and quickly becomes proficient in its use. But he returns to the old ways to reportedly participate in the infamous murder of Carmine Galante, the boss of the Bonanno Family. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join Apple users join Noiser+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Click the Noiser+ banner on Apple or go to noiser.com/subscriptions to get started with a 7-day free trial. On YouTube, subscribe to INFAMOUS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Hit “JOIN” on the Infamous America YouTube homepage.  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm4V_wVD7N1gEB045t7-V0w/featured For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Listener discretion is advised. Richard Kuklinski was now working as a freelance contract killer for all the big New York mob families. As word spread of his efficient, diligent reputation, Richard was traveling all over the world to execute, pun intended, his contracts. And no matter the situation, he approached every one of them methodically and calmly and kept his mouth shut when the job was finished. A non-Italian hitman who could be trusted was rare, and Richard's murder scheduling book was always full. Now, in the summer of 1976, Richard was on his way to Los Angeles for a job. He had flown to L.A. the previous year to handle some personal business, by which he meant he used a hand grenade to kill a porn shop owner

who owed him $10,000. Now he was in town on a job for Roy DeMaio, the Gambino family associate who was most closely connected to Richard. The man Richard needed to hunt down was craftier than most. He lived in a pink condo complex in Sherman Oaks, and he rarely left his home. When he did, he made sure there were plenty of witnesses. Richard watched the man for days and waited for an opportunity. But the longer Richard hung around, the greater the chance someone would be able to identify him. He was six foot five and weighed well over 200 pounds. He stuck out in a crowd.

Richard became frustrated, a rarity for him. Finally, an idea hit him. He had seen it work on a Bugs Bunny cartoon and figured he had nothing to lose. Richard approached the man's door and knocked several times. He knew the man was home and saw the light through the peephole as the man pressed his eye against it. Richard knocked again and waited as he saw a blurred shadow approach the door. Richard placed the barrel of his 38 against the peephole. When the shadowy figure filled the frame, which meant he was looking through the inside of the peephole,

Richard fired, hitting the man in the eye and killing him instantly. Richard calmly pocketed his gun and drove to West Hollywood for dinner before flying back to his family on the East Coast. Richard Kuklinski was now filling four to six contracts a month, which meant he was killing at least a person every week. And as he turned himself into a hitman machine, he wanted to expand his killing repertoire. Most jobs could be done with a knife or a gun,

but there were inherent risks with those methods. Richard decided it was time to learn how to use poison. From Black Barrel Media, this is Infamous America. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling the story of one of the most prolific, notorious, and terrifying

mafia hitman of all time. The Ice Man. This is episode three. The Galante assassination. In the second half of 1976, two new chapters were beginning in Richard Kuklinski's life. One was a criminal money-making enterprise

that also involved his evolution into poisons. That was the fast-laying chapter. that moved very quickly in the foreground. In the background, in the slow lane, was the changing of the guard in the Gambino family. A couple months after Richard returned from his mission to L.A. for Roy DeMayo, the Gambino family boss, Carlo Gambino, died.

Carlo wanted his brother-in-law, Paul Castellano, to take over as boss of the family. Castellano ascended to the throne of the biggest and most powerful of the five crime families in New York, and he instantly made enemies of 19 of his 20 captains. The only one who supported Castellano's promotion was Nino Gaji. Gaji, a small man with a big temper, had been tight with Castellano for 30 years. With Castellano now in the top spot, Gaji believed he would benefit. Roy DeMeo was also pleased with Castellano's new position.

DeMaio wasn't a captain. Technically, he wasn't even a soldier. To become a soldier in a crime family, you had to be a made man, and DeMeo's only goal in life was to be made. Roy DeMeo was part of Nino Gaji's crew, and now that Gaji's old friend Paul Castellano was the boss of the family, DeMayo was excited that his goal of becoming a made man was closer than ever. But that didn't mean it would actually happen. DeMayo was raking in a small fortune for Nino Gaji, who then funneled some of it to Castellano. The new mob boss was impressed, but not impressed enough to make Domeo. Castellano thought D'Meo was an unhinged psychopath who would attract the police.

On the psychopath part, he was right. D'Meo specialized in killing people for the mob, just like Richard Keklinski. But D'Meo often dismembered his victims and scattered their parts across the city to hide the crime. Regardless, Gaji continued to go to bat for D'Amble. But at least for now, Castellano wasn't budging. And DeMayo's next job for Richard Keklinski brought attention to the crew and the family that the bosses probably didn't want. But it vaulted Richard's growing legend into the stratosphere and made DeMaio love him even

more. DeMayo asked Richard to go up to Harlem to shake down a black guy who owned a bar. It seems the guy owed DeMaio a lot of money and had reneged on his payment plan. Richard drove uptown with a pair of helpers, Eddie and Freddie. No joke, those were their names. They pulled up to the bar. Eddie got out of the car and went inside. Eddie insisted he'd go in alone because he knew the owner from jail.

Richard sat in the car and wondered why he was even needed if Eddie could handle this so easily. Minutes later, Richard heard gunfire and shattering glass. He jumped out of the car and ran toward the bar. But before he made it with the door, someone hit him in the forehead with a Louisville slugger baseball bat. The bat nearly cracked his skull, but Richard managed to stay on his feet. He pulled out his gun and headed back toward the door when Eddie burst outside clutching his stomach. He'd been shot, and Richard demanded they go in and get the bastards who did it. Eddie said that would be stupid. There were way too many of them.

They fled the scene, and Richard doctored Eddie's bullet wound. When they were safe and able to regroup, they called Roy DeMayo and told him what happened. The three hitmen wanted to grab heavy-duty weapons and returned to Harlem for payback. Reluctantly, DeMayo gave them the go-ahead. They drove to Eddie's place in Hell's Kitchen. He had a steamer trunk filled with guns, and they loaded up. Richard grabbed a 12-gauge shotgun. Eddie and Freddie grabbed Mack 10s, machine pistols that fired 30 rounds,

per second. They were going to lay waste to a bar in Harlem. Richard, Eddie, and Freddie drove back to the bar and parked out front. Richard's forehead wound had swelled to the size of an orange, but he didn't care. He was likely so filled with rage he barely felt it. Richard charged inside, and the other two followed. They shot at anything that moved and virtually everything that didn't. Richard's shotgun boomed as he blasted everyone he saw. The Mac 10s, word as their bullets sprayed the bar. It was a bloodbath, and it was over in seconds. The men piled back into their car and drove back to Brooklyn. Freddie told Roy DeMaio how Richard had gone inside the bar by himself and fearlessly started

shooting. Domeo was beyond thankful. Even though it was the exact opposite of the low-key murders that were Richard's hallmark, the Harlem shootout sent a hell of a message to people who thought they could fight the Gambino family. The legend of Richard Kukklinsky grew, though few people even knew his name. He was either the big guy or the Polack. But Roy DeMayo certainly knew, and he gave Richard a hug

and a basket filled with Italian meats as an additional thank you. Richard was not as excited as everyone else. He drove home with the biggest headache he'd ever had. He wondered why he'd gotten involved in this mess. He was nearly killed, The whole endeavor was stupid. He silently blamed DeMeo,

and Richard was more determined than ever to kill Roy DeMeo. Richard's association with Roy DeMeo was somewhat complex. Doing jobs for DeMeo had further opened the door for Richard to work with the most powerful mafia families on the East Coast. But the new Gambino boss, Paul Costellano's assessment of DeMeo, was right on the money. DeMeo was unhinged and often out of control. Three years earlier, DeMeo thought Richard insulted him, and DeMayo and a couple goons

beat Richard so badly that Richard had to go to the hospital. Under any other circumstances, Richard would have fought back, and probably would have killed the offenders by now. But at the time, Richard just had to take it. DeMayo wasn't a made man, but so closely connected to the most powerful crime family in New York that Richard couldn't touch him, yet. After Richard was forced to absorb the painful and humiliating beatdown, he vowed to kill Roy DeMaio.

But the time wasn't right, so he waited and accepted jobs from DeMayo and hugs and meat baskets. And with each new job, especially ones like the Crazy Harlem Shootout, Richard's reputation as a hitman grew. As his reputation grew, so did the demand for his abilities. As he accepted more and more contracts, he searched for new ways to kill people. In the late 1970s, he became interested in poison, and to get it, he turned to one of the few people he could call a friend.

Maybe friend was too strong a word, but the man was at least a social acquaintance, and, of course, a partner in crime. His name was Phil Solomene. Solomene had a store in Patterson, New Jersey. At least, it was supposed to be a store. The place had no sign. out front, and everything he sold was stolen, from innocuous things like small appliances,

coffee, and perfume, to serious things like drugs, pornography, and guns. Solomene was a slick schemer with slicked back black hair, and, like Richard, he would do anything for a dollar. Well, anything but kill. Phil Solamine was not a killer, but he had no issue with setting people up to be robbed and killed. Richard had met Phil through the criminal underworld and they developed a scheme. Phil would offer merchandise and when a buyer showed up with cash, Soleimine would call Richard. Within minutes, Richard would stop by, hang out with the buyer, get him alone, and then kill him. Then Richard and

Solomene would split the money that the buyer had brought to make the purchase. The concept was simple but effective. And over time, Richard allowed himself to become friendly with Phil Solomene. Richard and his wife Barbara socialized with Solomene and his wife. Phil Solomene was one of the only people in America who knew Richard's home phone number and address. That would come back to haunt both of them, but for now, Richard had a request for the guy who trafficked in stolen goods and seemed to be able to get anything. Poison. Richard said he wanted to to kill rats, big rats, so he needed something big. Cyanide, strychnine, or arsenic. Phil Solomene went to work. A few days later, Solomene introduced Richard to a pharmacist who

would sell him all the poison he wanted. The pharmacist, Paul Hoffman, was greedy and involved with the mob. Turns out it didn't take much work for Phil Solomene to make the connection. Hoffman had been buying hijacked drugs from solomene for years and selling them for huge profits, everything from aspirin and antibiotics to diet pills. Now Hoffman agreed to sell Richard the poison and tutor him on the proper doses. Obviously, Richard wasn't trying to kill rats, so he needed to know how much poison to use for victims who were usually adult males. Hoffman explained that if Richard used too much of the poison,

the police could determine the cause of death. If he didn't use enough, it might make the person sick, but it wouldn't kill him. The trick was to use just enough, and in just the right way, to make it look like the victim died of something other than obvious poison. Maybe the cops would figure it out anyway, but at least it would take them a while. Richard was trying to kill a lieutenant in the Bonano family and wanted to test the poison. The job wouldn't be easy. The Bonanno Lieutenant was Tony Scavelli, and he always had two bodyguards with him.

Richard had already stocked Tony for nearly two weeks and could never get close enough to make a move. That helped drive his interest in poison. Richard was always methodical about planning a hit, which was part of the reason the mob loved him, but two weeks was a long time. Usually it took a day or two for him to figure out a plan, so this case clearly called for something different. Paul Hoffman showed Richard how to mix cyanide with another liquid and then pour it into a hypodermic needle. Hoffman called it a lethal hot shot. In the spring of 1977, Richard followed Scavelli into a nightclub and sauntered toward him on the dance floor, moving in rhythm to the blasting dance

music. Richard took an angle that would allow him to slip past Scavelli and move straight to the exit. Richard bopped through the crowd, moved close to Scavelli, jabbed him with the needle, and continued right out the door. Within a minute, Scavelli collapsed on the dance floor. Within two minutes, he was dead. Everyone just assumed it was a heart attack. Even the autopsy didn't detect the poison. Richard, with Hoffman's guidance, had used exactly the right amount.

After that incredibly successful trial run with a need, and a poison, Richard was hooked. He started to use the poisons, which he referred to as his new friends, full-time. And he quickly expanded his horizons in terms of delivery methods. A made man in the Genovese family named Billy Mana was Richard's next target. Richard contacted Mana and invited him out for a drink, saying he had a ton of fur coats he wanted to sell really cheap. They met at a bar in Union City, New Jersey. When Mana went to the bathroom, Richard dumped a pinky-sized vial of cyanide into his drink. After Mana finished it, Richard ordered another round.

Before drink number two arrived, Mana was already choking. His eyes swelled and he clutched his throat. He toppled over and crashed to the floor. Richard yelled heart attack, call a doctor. Then, while all eyes were on the fallen man, Richard casually disappeared. But he looked forward to Carmine Galante's release from prison. In 1962, he had been convicted of drug trafficking and was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison.

He served 12, and in 1974, he was released. He had risen up through the ranks of the Bonanno Crime Family and was underbossed to Joseph Bonano at the time of his conviction. Galante helped establish a heroin smuggling pipeline to the U.S., but then he went to prison for his efforts. While he was away, the shadowy governing body of the mafia in those days, known as the Commission, forced Joseph Bonano to retire. Rusty Restelli became the new boss, and then, two years after Galante was released from prison, Rostelli went to prison. Galante took control of the Bonano family by force and immediately became a brash and aggressive

tyrant. He cranked up the drug trade and went after his enemies, mostly the Gambino family. Galante became so greedy and violent that the heads of the other four families secretly met in Boca Raton and decided that Galante had to go. It was rumored that Joseph Bonano himself, the man who had guided Galante's entire career, sanctioned the hit. In Richard Kuclinski's version of the story, Roy DeMaio, the Gambino Family Associate, organized the assassination of Carmine Galante. It was the summer of 1979, and it would not be an easy job. Galante was crafty. He knew people wanted him dead. He didn't follow a predictable routine. He was always armed, as were his two bodyguards who accompanied him everywhere. But even though he tried to be unpredictable, he enjoyed a particular

restaurant in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn. It was called Joe and Mary's Italian-American restaurant, and it was owned by his friend Giuseppe Toronto, who may also have been a Bonano Soldier. The restaurant was small, long, and narrow. The front door on Knickerbocker Avenue was the only way in or out. There was a small, square, outdoor patio in the back. Tall All buildings rose up on three sides of the patio, and the only way to get to it was to walk through the entire length of the restaurant. Carmine Galante only ate on the patio so that he and his bodyguards could see anyone coming. The setup was great for security, which was obviously why Galante liked it, and it was terrible for an assassination. But there was no choice. It was

happening there. Richard said he and DeMeo met at the restaurant in the second week of July, 1979 to scout it out. Richard didn't like the setup, but DeMeo assured him that at least one, or maybe both, of Galante's bodyguards was in on the hit. Richard would already be inside the restaurant eating lunch when Galante arrived, so he wouldn't attract suspicion. DeMeo would provide two more guys as insurance, and they would get the job done. On July 12, 1979, Carmine Galante entered the restaurant with his two bodyguards. He walked out to the patio and began lunch with the owner, Giuseppe Toronto. Soon, another friend and Bonano captain, Leonard Coppola, arrived and joined the group on the patio.

According to Richard, he sat inside, eating a meatball sub and reading a newspaper, and watched the group assemble on the patio. At about 2.45 p.m., Richard's two backup gunmen arrived. He strode through the restaurant toward the patio to get the show started. In the official version, it was reported that three men wearing ski masks walked out onto the patio and started blasting. Richard certainly would have been smart to wear a mask as a six-foot-five, 300-pound monster of a man who would have been easy to identify. Either way, the three assassins barged onto the patio and opened fire. Galante, Toronto, and Coppola were all shot multiple.

several times in the head and body. Galante fell out of his chair and slumped to the ground. As his body came to rest, his head was propped up in an awkward angle against the cement curve around the patio. One of his many gunshot wounds was to the left eye, and he died with a cigar still dangling from his lips. Photos of the crime scene are some of the most infamous in mafia history. Toronto and Coppola also died, but the bodyguard. were unharmed. The assassins fled the restaurant after a brazen daylight murder, that, of course, went unsolved for several years. During the historic courtroom trial in the mid-1980s, that was known as the Mafia Commission trial, Anthony Indelicado was the only person convicted of the

Galante murders. The trial was the fruit of a decade of labor by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, and it tore apart the old fabric of the five New York crime families. It certainly didn't end the mafia, but it did end the good old days. And beyond the fallout for the mob, the trial has two interesting connections to infamous America. Anthony Indelicado was married to a woman named Catherine Burke. Catherine was the daughter of Jimmy Burke, the charismatic gangster whose crew pulled off the Lafantanza heist. Jimmy was played by Robert. De Niro in the movie Goodfellas. And one of the other eight defendants in the trial was Christopher Fernari, better known as Christy the Tick. He supervised the Pierre Hotel heist on behalf of the

Lucchese family. And there's actually another connection around this time to the Miami drug wars. At the same time Richard Kuclinski was establishing himself as a premier hitman in New York, Griselda Blanco was establishing herself as a drug-smuggling entrepreneur in the same city. By the time Carmine Galante was killed, she had set up her operation in Miami, and her associates in the fast-rising Medellin cartel were about to cause Richard to do some work in Brazil. Cocaine became the drug of choice in America in the late 1970s and 1980s. Dealers couldn't sell it fast enough, and all the mob families in New York, got in on the new way to make ungodly amounts of money.

As Roy DeMeo got deeper into the business for the Gambino family, he employed Richard Kuclinski as a guard at a drug warehouse. But soon, Roy being Roy, he needed Richard's other services. DeMayo had been getting his cocaine from the Madeiro brothers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. But then Pablo Escobar and the Ochoa brothers and the rest of the Medellin cartel came along and they sold it for cheaper prices than the Medeiros. DeMeo wanted to switch dealers, and he decided not to pay the Medeiros for their latest shipment.

By that point, he owed more than half a million dollars, so he figured it was a bargain to pay Richard $60,000 to fly to Rio and kill the two brothers. Richard had met them once, and he actually liked them, but he agreed to do the job anyway. He packed two guns in a wooden box, and shipped them to himself at the Copacabana Palace. Then he hopped a flight to Rio.

He took a cab from the airport to his luxury hotel, but his guns never arrived. Richard guessed they had been intercepted by a customs agent. He had used a fake name to ship them so there wouldn't be any blowback there, but now he needed to find guns in Rio, and he didn't speak Portuguese. He sat at a shaded outdoor cafe

and tried to think of a plan. He noticed a group of young kids peddling drugs along the sidewalks near the beach. He motioned to one of the boys, made the universal shape of a gun with his hand, and communicated that he wanted to buy a gun. The kid said to meet him at the same spot tomorrow at noon. For $100, he'd have his gun. Sure enough, the following day, the kid handed Richard a brown paper bag with a 38-caliber Smith & Wesson inside.

Richard paid him, went back to his hotel room, and cleaned and oiled it. The revolver was fully loaded, but there were no extra bullets, so he would have to make each of his six rounds count. Next, he went to a hardware store and bought a hammer, pliers, and a screwdriver. He used them to steal a van, and then he spent a couple hours driving around the city, trying to remember where the Medeiros lived. He'd only been to their compound once, but he eventually figured out the location. He parked his stolen van outside their fortified gate and waited.

Finally, the gate opened and a yellow Mercedes drove out. There were four men in it, the Madeiro brothers and two others. Richard followed them down to the beach, where the four men parked and went into a restaurant on a quiet street. Richard let the air out of their front left tire and returned to his house. van and waited for what seemed like forever. Eventually, the four men exited the restaurant, all drunk and very relaxed. As they approached their Mercedes, one of the Medeiro brothers noticed the flat tire. Another man opened the trunk and removed the spare. Richard got out of his van and approached in the shadows. As he got closer, the Medeiro brothers saw them, but they didn't believe

it was him. What the hell would he be doing down here? And that was when Richard pulled out his Smith and Wesson and fired four times. He put one bullet in each man and killed three of the four right away. He needed a second shot to finish off Eduardo Madero, but he never used his last bullet. He drove the van to the other side of the city, wiped it down for fingerprints, threw the gun in the ocean, and returned to his hotel. The next morning, he was on a plane to America and nobody in Brazil was the wiser. Next time on Infamous America, Richard Kuklinski meets and learns from a hit man who might be more terrifying than himself and Roy DeMaio.

Richard helps John Gotti with a personal and bloody favor, but he also commits two murders that will come back to haunt him. Richard has been on an amazing streak of murders with no consequences, but nothing lasts forever. The slow end begins next week on Infamous America. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week for new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes.

Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships begin at just $5 per month. This series was researched and written by Brian Frazier. Original music by Rob Valier. I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. Find us at our website, blackbarrelmedia.com or on our social media channels. We're Black Barrel Media on Facebook and Instagram and B-Beryl Media on Twitter, and you can stream all our episodes on YouTube.

Just search for Infamous America Podcast. Thanks for listening.