Interviews are a strange thing to behold.

Frankie D

Frrankie D

I’ve interviewed writers, which is easy. You can sit down with a guy like Richard Kadrey and ask if he prefers Sam Peckinpah or Sergio Leone. Or a guy like Todd Robinson and ask about the benefits using a Sharpie as a weapon. Those are less interviews and more conversations with people who have read the same books as you and watched the same movies. You can talk shit and before you know it, 3 hours have passed.

Frank DiMatteo was different…

The man has been places and done things most people have only seen in movies or read in books.

His father was a hit man and muscle for the Gallo Brothers and was active in organized crime for about 30 years. Frank was no angel either.

As a wise man once said, “Be about some shit.” Frankie DiMatteo is about some shit.

I was nervous going into the interview. I didn’t realize how nervous until I listened to the recording. Now I’m mildly embarrassed.

I could have talked to Frank for hours. After the interview was over I thought of 100 more questions I should have asked.

There will be a part 2 down the road

Dave Wahlman: Frank, can you hear me ok?

Frank DiMatteo: Yes.

D: All right. First, I want to tell you why I wanted to interview you. If I speak too fast and you can’t hear me, just tell me.

F: Ok.

PresidentStreetBoysD: Reading your book (THE PRESIDENT STREET BOYS), I loved it and I found it fascinating. The tone is drastically different from any other mafia type books I’ve read. It became very clear that you are not trying to justify anything, you are not trying to prove anything, and frankly you are not a rat.

F: No.

D: Which changes everything. Your book is a rabbit hole of the best kind. I basically want to help promote it and readers are going to make (when they read your book) their own judgment about you. But I want to give you, you know…

I have questions for you and I wanted to give you a voice.

F: Ok, thank you.

D: So your book, it says in the opening, it’s not a tell-all. Can you tell me more about that?

F: Well, the statue of limitations under law, you can’t say everything you want to say, unless you are a rat, then you get a pass. And with anything, you know, you gotta be careful of what you said.

D: Absolutely.

F: That is basically why, you know, I started like that. I mean it could’ve been more interesting, you know,  if I could’ve just said everything I wanted to say, but no, you can’t do that.

D: I found it interesting that you are very clear in it about what you will say and won’t say. Did you have any concerns prior to writing the book that there could be any repercussion on you or anything?

F: Well, I waited. I waited till a lot of guys passed away because they were friends of mine and uh, I was close with them at one point. I didn’t want to give nobody a headache, you know, by saying anything or implicating anybody in anything that would hurt anybody. So I tried to be as, you know, as patient as I can and wait as long as I can, you know, to put the book out. Pretty much, when my father passed away and he asked me to make sure that, two things: make sure that most of everybody is dead, try to wait for everybody to be dead, and do not say nothing bad about someone who, you know, couldn’t protect themselves or answer you back. And to put it in writing, you know, say something bad about someone true or not, have no way to get back to you to argue points so it wouldn’t be right. So I’m trying not to, get into any shouting matches with anybody.

D: That was, uh, I really liked that. That’s kind of the takeaway I got from it, and I thought that’s pretty brilliant. I thought, “You got nothing to prove, you are not looking for a paycheck.” The tone was just so different.

F: For me it was like a memoir. I set that by accident. I was just sitting down, talking and saying, “You know, reflecting on what I’ve seen or did over the last 50 years,” and I said, “You know its pretty damn interesting.” Or somebody around me said it was pretty damn interesting, and that’s how it all started, you know, as a memoir.

D: The other thing I’ve noticed about you, everything you were a part of and grew up around, you are clearly smart. And you are clearly lucky. Do you have any thoughts about that as to how you were able to be a part of everything and still here, frankly?

920x920F: Well, we got to credit that to Ricky (his father). Ricky was a brilliant man, I mean as bad as he was in certain ways, he was brilliant in other ways. He was always evasive and he was always independent, and he was very smart keeping you out of things that weren’t pertaining to you. He wasn’t one of those stupid men that would talk about everything when there wasn’t a need to talk to you about it or bring you into conversations when it wasn’t pertaining to you.

I think I mentioned in the book we had, a meeting with … in Staten Island, it was a business dinner, I think it was about the Sopranos. And we were sitting there having dinner, it was a business dinner, monkey business but it was business. As we start talking he just looked at me and put his hand on my arm and said, “You know, you are more than welcome to stay,” he says “But you know, you’re not needed to.” You know, you are welcome to stay because I have earned the right to stay. It was his way of saying not to sit in on it because it’s got nothing to do with you. Because if something went bad, you weren’t at the conversation. So he was a smart guy, respectful but smart.

D: That’s more than most you hear about and read about.

F: The guy was brilliant, I mean, and not because he was my father. He was just, you know, when you have time to look back on it, he was just many, many things. As far as being, you know, and started out with a Tony Bender in early ’59. All the way to the Gallo brothers. And wined up with … and he was always with them but he was always an independent. Meaning that he would never obligate himself. Smartest gangster not made.

D: That’s something.

F: He would always pass it up. Most guys wanted it. He would say, “No, thank you, and you can pass it on to the next guy.”

D: That kind of fascinated me with your father. People would constantly reach out to him and want him to be part of their crews but he knew. That just clearly highlights his intelligence, you know.

F: Yes definitely, you know he did. You know, he is a high school grad I think he went to a little college so he wasn’t really a dummy.

D: A side note, I gotta tell you, from reading your book. I started writing down questions; I knew immediately that I wanted to interview you. And honestly I could talk to you for hours; there’s a thousand questions I could ask you.

F: Thank you.

D: But I wanted to keep specific instances out of the interview. Like I said, I want readers to get that, I do not want to ruin the book for them. Your father: when were you first aware of his life and the extent of his activities?

F: I had to be about ten. Don’t forget, I came in the picture when I was about five, so by ten you are a little smarter. Six, seven, eight anybody tells you, you think you are smart but you are full of shit. At ten, I realized that maybe these guys are more and more; these uncles were a lot different than other guys. By twelve, I was in the street driving (laughs) so at ten I would say I picked up on the real difference.

D: Here’s something I was always wondered about. Now, when you see all the books and movies out there, you see the Gallos are both known and unknown.

There have been references to them and pretty significant movies, the Bob Dylan song (Joey).

F: I love the Bob Dylan song. It’s really depressing.

D: How are they both known and unknown? I mean it just seemed like this whole story should be known and its not.

F: Well, the problem with everybody is… I’m writing a screenplay right now. The problem is that everything is centered around Joey Gallo. Writers, screenplay writers and book writers, they get lost in Joey Gallo.

And they don’t realize there was a whole crew. Joey is just a figurehead, or main character amongst 60 guys. So the problem is with all of them when, I read everything, plus they are all full of shit because of Hollywood, they make these stories up. And they are just so far fetched and not true, so we don’t like them at all, you know. But that’s the problem; they set it around Joey and leave everybody else out. And the whole thing was done by, you know 50-60 guys. The characters were more interesting than Joey, but you know, Joey had the name but everybody else did the work.

D: I mean, two of the books that are out there only talk about him. There is that movie where Peter Boyle played Joey Gallo (Crazy Joe), which is a great B movie, but its pretty much bullshit.

F: Is that the one where they have Larry driving off the bridge killing himself?

D: Yeah.

F: Horrible man, horrible, its just horrible. I don’t know any other words for that. And its so historically wrong, you know. But that’s Hollywood.

D: How did it affect your father and the rest of the guys when this movie came out?

F: Well, they didn’t like it. They didn’t like the portrayal of it. Even the wise guys, even the quiet ones, they like recognition in some capacity, you know what I mean? When you see stuff like that, you know, especially when it’s not true. It’s not right.

D: It was, like I said, I thought it was entertaining but it was very wrong

F: It was strictly Hollywood. Nothing was right in the movie; it was just a Hollywood B movie.

D: Does that bother you when you see… There is a passage in your book when you are talking about people, like they talk a lot about the mafia, but they very rarely know what the hell they are talking about. Does that get to you?

F: Well, civilians are the ones that annoy people. I mean, you’re in the life or you weren’t in the life. And than a banana tells you, “Oh you can’t say that,” and you look at them and you say, “You don’t know what you are talking about because you had an uncle and a friend or you are around and you think you know something. You really know nothing.” You know what I mean, you know nothing, so you’re not just supposed to toss out those old words like omertà*, you’re not supposed to do that and you’re not supposed to do a lot of things. So, you know, it’s really a civilian who talks like that.

D: From reading your book, you have instances where you see people and they are dropping names and they get called on it. I never could understand how somebody could drop a name. That just seems like, that just blew me away. It’s like, especially at the capacity they are at and in the surroundings they are in. It just amazed me.

F: Yeah, well, people do those. I wrote about one of those kids that Franky…. He just thought no one would pick up on it that; there are no friends around. He was in a strange place so he was just flexing. At the time that was happening, the Gallo name was pretty strong, you know, in Brooklyn so, you know it was just a flex. Not knowing where you are is what gets you in trouble.

D: Very, very true.

F: Everybody drops names, sometimes you have to drop a name, cause you have to. Its important. Its important not to make yourself look bac514e03dda19d40b826761d80d6f84b9d. You can make yourself look bad especially if you can’t back it up, but it could be done if you are in certain situation when it needs to be done. And there is a way to do it. If you didn’t know how, there is a way to do it.

D: Something about the crew that I’ve noticed, and that was pretty different from everything else, was the diversity of the crew. It wasn’t just Italians.

F: Not at all.

D: Can you tell me more about that, how that worked and how the perception of it at the time was?

F: I knew Joey very, very little. Don’t forget, Joey went away when I was five or six and came back when I was fifteen. He was only on the street a year, so Joey is the least of the crew members that I knew.

But, being there, you knew that. In the early days, south Brooklyn was very, very, you know, Italian. But Atlantic Avenue had a lot of Syrians and they were hoodlums. And what happened with Joey and them, they had no prejudice against anyone. If you are a hoodlum and you could earn money, they would get together. And Larry and Joey ended up getting close with the lot of, you know, mostly they were Syrians. That’s why they ended up getting close because they were hoodlums and then whole neighborhood and it just all worked out. And they become friends and they did bad things together.

D: Was there any push back from other crews or other people from working with people who are not Italians?

F: No, to tell you the truth, no. Not true, and the guys like Louie the Syrian were very well respected. And me, seeing them as a young, young kid and that being there myself, with them, he was well respected and no one would say that. You had different degrees of guys involved. You know, there was a regular hood guy who was just there or Puerto Rican or Syrian or, you know, an Irishman, they weren’t privy to the inner circle. They were just hoodlums. They were part of the crew, the inner circle, a guy like Louie the Syrian, he was very important in the whole thing. You wouldn’t even know he was a Syrian. Nobody was talking about it, you wouldn’t know, he was more Italian than me. (laughs)

D: I am half Italian and people constantly ask me if I’m Lebanese.

F: Really?

D: It’s more than I was actually asked if I’m Italian. (laughs) It says in the book that your dad was on point about many things. When the Gallo brothers decided to kidnap all of those guys (the Profaci crew) he said, “It’s a bad idea,” and “We shouldn’t let them go.” Now, what were his thoughts on, let me see, for instance when Joey Gallo faces Bobby Kennedy at the hearing? Was he upset about, that he went out there and did, like, Richard Widmark act?0206b690017fe2791eb02968c315139b

F: No, he wasn’t upset. Just some of the guys were more serious than others. It was just Joey being Joey again. No more detail than that. Like, “Oh, that was bad,” or “Oh, he’s going to hurt us.” None of that. Everybody just thought it was just Joey being Joey. Everybody was very used to how Joey was acting. Joey, the character. He was a character. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Facial expressions, you know, whatever he did. Whatever he did it, was constant. No one was surprised what Joey did that.

D: It does take balls. (laughs)

F: Yeah, he was very ballsy. He wasn’t a normal man. I mean, not talking about normal men. I’m talking about guys who d62c19cad7aaae869280d07796ee67f6were born hoodlums. Not chosen hoodlums, born that way. So it’s a different breed. I would see guys from the 20s, 30s, 40s even the 50s and 60s who were born into it. Guys today, they just want to be assholes, you know. They wanna make a lot of money and be a rat. It’s a whole different character of being a hoodlum now.

D: Now, again going back to the crew. You mentioned, you referred to the crew as the six family basically.

F: Yes.

D: How did that work? Because it seems like such a tight hierarchy. How could a crew operate like that?

F: Because Larry and Joey would constantly say, “Fuck Joe Profaci or fuck Joe Colombo,” and they would keep things in house. I mean, someone would have to go meet with them after ’62 or ’63 with Colombo but it was half-assed, you know what I mean?

Because they ran the crew as a family. Everything went through Joey or Larry. Well, Larry, because Joey went to jail. Or Blast. So it was tight. There was a head but none bothered with them. Maybe Larry or Blast would deal with the Colombo family or you know, hierarchy, but the crew was strictly with the Gallos. If someone would ask you who are you with, you would say you are with the Gallos.

I never heard the expression used, “We are with the Colombos.” Colombos were a different crew on the other side of the bridge. Same family but it was just so tight with the crew, it was, you know, you are with Joey Gallo. That’s how it was, there was no difference, and even the people in the neighborhood, or even other gangsters they would say this guy is with Joey or he is with the Gallos. Nobody said he was a Colombo. No one. Unheard of. That’s why you turn around and say there is sixth family. Because, amongst the hoodlums, it was set that way.

D: I never would’ve thought about it like that.

F: I mean, its true. Even growing up and you would go somewhere, you would hear, “Who’s that guy, who is he with?” You never heard the word Colombo. You would here they are with Joey. They are with the Gallo boys. So, if you think about it like that, especially when the parent companies, the Profacis or the Colombos, they’ve been around for 50 years, you know, they are big shots and nobody would refer to them at all.

D: Something now, going back to the neighborhood, President Street itself, the way you describe it in the book, is almost like a natural fortress. Like you guys are surrounded.

F: Yes.

D: Can you tell me more about that?

President StreetF: Well the block was, it was one short block. It was between the water and it was two blocks long. It was between Sixth Street and….. Water at one end and the other end was a dead end, at the highway. So it was two blocks. And everyone who lived on the block has been there for a hundred years. Those families on President Street have been there forever.

They were either related or somehow related like marriage. You know, they were family somehow. When the boys had the clubs, they would have five clubs, you know the Luncheonette was a club; we had one, two, three, four, five clubs next to each other on one half of the block. So it was really tight. There were some houses with back yards and they were all family or very old people who would had been there forever. Some were long shore men with their families and kids. So it was a very tight neighborhood. Or a very tight two blocks anyway.

D: I grew up in the North End of Boston, and this is something I wanted to ask you about. You talk about how the neighborhood has changed and how its become pretty gentrified. Does that ever bother you when you go back and see it?

F: You know, at first my mind goes every day, first it’s like, “Oh man, all these yuppies are here, they took the neighborhood.” But no one took anything. We walked away. Now, you want to reflect back and say we made a mistake, which we did, by walking away because it was a beautiful neighborhood. It had everything that we wanted. My grandfather was a long shore man, he was one of the guys who built that neighborhood. But you move on. You sit back now and reflect, wondering if what we moved on to is better. I don’t think so. I don’t think it’s better, it’s just different. And times have changed. The Monday morning quarterbacks, it’s always easy to sit back and reflect on how you’ve fucked up. We fucked up.

D: Hindsight is 20/20, as they say.

F: Exactly. But no one took it from us. We sold it. We moved away. We wanted better. We didn’t see what we had.

D: Your dad, he was clearly rough and tumble. It describes, you mentioned him getting shot on more than one occasion.

F: Yes.

D: Something I’ve always been curious about. I was an EMT for a long time. You guys speak of basic medical care. That’s something I’ve always wondered about. Can you elaborate on that?

F: Well, I mean one time we had a local doctor and (he passed away now) but he was on the block and my father got shot in the leg. And we just took him to a local GP (general practitioner) and he was a friend and we called him up and he had to do what he had to do. He went in there with a hammer and chisel. Knocked the bullet out of my father’s leg. My father had a belt in his mouth and a bottle of scotch.

If you are lucky to have a medical doctor that was with you, you know you wanted to stay away from the hospital because than the law comes. And these guys are nutty not like “Oh, bring me to the hospital because I’m gonna die.” Nah. They’re not that way. They are pretty much, you know take the pain and go on. They were pretty nutty with their philosophy and everything.

D: That’s the kind of thing you see portrayed in movies and I was always wondering about that. How they managed. It makes sense to pay a doctor. When you can’t go to the hospital or if you need to get something done but you risk running into law enforcement.

F: Exactly, yes, because those guys in those days were real hoodlums. They are not like today. Today they would’ve ran to the hospital. Those days they kept everything on the QT. So they would go to the private doctor or get somebody or do it themselves. They would do it to themselves. I saw guys stitch themselves and medicate themselves. They don’t want the law. The law to them was never no good in any capacity. You go to the hospital and you know they would come.

So you would try to avoid that in any capacity and these guys would take chances with their life. But they took chances with their lives anyway. So doing this was not out of the ordinary.

D: Let me ask you this. Between the 1950’s and today, what are your thoughts on the state of it? I’m not going to give it a name but you know what I mean.

F: It’s definitely not at all what it was 20 years ago. Not at all. To me, it’s a bunch of clowns. That’s what I think, a bunch of fucking clowns just playing games. You know, waiting, doing bad things, waiting to get arrested and then get themselves out of trouble. They don’t have the background to do it. They don’t have the incentive. A lot of guys today come from money, so they don’t have the upbringing. They don’t have the mentors around them to teach them the ropes. So, to me, its just bunch of clowns.

D: See, that is something I gather about you: you were clearly schooled. Like, you had good people looking out for you. I mean are you happy you are out of it today, but do you miss it at all?

F: Yes. I miss it a lot, because you lose a lot. You lose your prestige, you lose making money, you lose a lot. But you gain a lot too. You get your freedom, you get your life. But in your mind, being so used to that. You look back and say, “Fuck, I wish it was 30 years ago.”

I’m in my car with my wife, somebody cuts me off and I just look straight and I say, “Motherfucker…” I don’t want to go to jail, just let it go. Thirty years ago I wouldn’t have let it go. Thirty years ago I would’ve taken the car, run them off the road and killed them. But you grow up or you get out of it, but that stuff you miss. Miss being what you were used to. Yeah, I do miss that a little bit. I mean, do you really want to do it right now? Nah, I am getting old. But you get those seconds or those minutes of, you know, that loss of power and you know, there is one jerk off who does something to you and you know, and you would’ve opened his ass up and you have to smile and walk away, it gets to you a little bit. But then you turn around and laugh and you have a good head on your shoulders, you laugh because you have grandchildren, you know and have to sit with lawyers, you weigh it all, it’s all better now. But you still have that; you did something so long you can never lose every feeling of it.

D: Your crew spent the good chunk of the 60s and 70s at a war footing. How did that effect function? I mean, it seems like when you read most, it’s all about business, and they tried to avoid war. But they were both in two prolonged times of conflict. How did that effect making money? I mean,did your father feel like that was bad or did he go with it because that was business?

F: He went with it because he had to go with it, but of course it was bad for business. You can’t run around, you can’t earn, the webgallo_tozziguys you were earning with before are not talking to you anymore because they are loyal to different people. Even if you weren’t a hundred percent loyal you had to stay where you were. So you lose money. You don’t have the freedom to move around because you are always at the end of a gun so it hurts in a lot of different ways. Don’t forget, the guys you were hanging out the day before are the guys you are shooting out the next day.

D: You see, that made me wonder why this not more known. Because this is the kind of Wild West story that people would want to hear about. It’s not known and frankly that’s surprising to me again and again.

F: Well because all they did was write book about Joey Gallo. (laughs)

D: What are your thoughts about the books that are out there about the Gallos?

F: I didn’t see one good one yet.

D: What about the one written by this guy named Tom Folsom?

F: Tom is a good friend of mine. This is what Tom did: Tom went and got 1500 pages of FBI files and wrote something. I don’t know, is that a book? I mean its a book, its good, I like Tom, I think he is a good writer, but I don’t see the flavor in it. I see it as an interpretation of 1500 pages of files. Nah. It was entertaining, it probably sold well, but do I think its a good Gallo crew book? No, not at all.

D: Again like you said, the books before. They are just about Gallo.

F: It’s the first book where we mention everybody. We tried to bring everybody else in to it: the crew, not just Joey.

D: You definitely succeeded there. I mean, I started writing questions down for you and then when it gets to the end of the book and you mentioned you’ve a second book coming. That’s when I kind of went like, “Ok, let me re-do my questions.” That started to make more sense because there was no way the story can be contained to 228 pages.

F: Right, that’s why I ended it. Because it was two different times in our lives. So like I said, it ended in ’91 and we went on to the next stage.

D: I don’t want to talk about the next stage. Honestly, when your next book comes out I would like to talk to you again. I want to let people get to that point in the book because when I got there, it changed everything for me. (laughs)

F: Yeah, its gonna be interesting. I do have another book called, “ SCREW YOU,” and I am trying to get a publisher right now.

D: What is that one about?

F: It is about porno.

D: Oh, Al Goldstein!

F: Yes, yes. It’s the whole thing how he got started the 60’s, the way he took it. He was a pioneer in, you know, and how we got involved with him, and how the 30 years went by. But it’s more of a history lesson of the porno world. I think its pretty interesting.

D: People today have no idea how much organized crime involved porn.

F: Oh my God. They’ve always been involved in porno. They never would’ve gotten in the streets if it wasn’t for it. Even as far as what you call it, funding, and getting it in the streets with muscle. It’s been funded since the 50’s by some wisely. Every peepshow on 42nd street were run by wise guys. That whole red light district on 42nd street was run by wise guys.

D: There is a new TV series coming up by David Simon, creator of the Wire on HBO called the Deuce. It was supposed to be all about that, about 42nd street.

F: Oh really? Interesting, if they did their research. It’s all public record.

D: Honestly, I think that might be a good one. David Simon is a very, very good journalist. He knows exactly how to get to the root of things.

F: David Simon, what’s his name? Simon?

D: Yes, he did the Wire. Again, this is gonna be cool when you do write the next book, when people get to that last page of the book, like I did, they are going to say that changes everything.

F; Yeah, well that’s why I left it off like that. Because it is interesting.

D: Oh, you left it off like a cliffhanger! (laughs) You have to, especially with the subject matter.

F: I’m not a “writer” writer, so it’s not easy for me. But I’m learning more, I’m getting better.

D: Interviewing you was a challenge for me. I interviewed a number of writers and talking to a writer is pretty easy. You are different for obvious reasons and I’m enjoying it, and it’s all new to me. (laughs)

F: Yes, me too.

D: What are your thoughts about the publicity on this book? You mentioned that in the end of the book , that basically, you are ready for it. Whatever comes, good and bad. Can you elaborate on that?

F: Well, a lot of people like it, a lot of people have something to say. You always get somebody who will say something. You can’t make everybody happy. But I was hoping that if it’s read right, most of the people will think the same thing you think. It’s a good story, you know. But then there’s old people, there’s people who are set in their bullshit; you can’t say this, you can’t say that. But they are morons, so, you know, we are going to get that, too. Whatever comes, comes. I’m not worried about it. They said something already but it don’t matter.

D: I admire how you handled it. You put it out very clearly. Nobodies ever done that.

F: Right.

D: Let me ask about GOODFELLAS by Pileggi. At this point in time, it has been wildly discredited as unreliable because Hill was a rat. He wanted to please the government and make money because he was a junkie piece of shit. What are your thoughts on the books that have been written by guys who were proven rats looking for a paycheck?

F: They are lies. They can’t find the truth in it because they are all lies. I read them all. Some of them I know, some of them I don’t. They lie and they never, ever commit themselves to the shit they did, except for the Hollywood stuff. Henry Hill’s book was so much bullshit, its unbelievable. The guy who used to get sandwiches for everybody, they made him into this big, big shot. He was a real gofer. They made him into a star, you can’t believe anything over there [Hollywood.] If you knew him, you’d know he is full of shit. I think my father smacked him a couple of times, years ago. (laughs) He smacked him because he was being stupid. I think it was at the Golden Dome, which was Paul Vario’s place. They did the book and made him a star.

Then they got Liotta to play him. The guy is too good looking to play Henry Hill. The guy was ugly. The book made him into a big shot, made him closer to Pauly. But the guy strictly just went and got sandwiches. He was a joke and most of the book sucked. Its funny, the rat books, they get a pass, but they still lie. They can tell the truth but they still lie. Why? All the books annoy me.

D: Final question. You have an open floor to say whatever you want.

F: It’s a personal memoir, you know. I had nothing to gain except to sell books and maybe make some money that way. We all gotta make a living, but it was done as a memoir. I didn’t hurt anyone, I never got questioned about it by anybody. It was an experience. I didn’t judge anybody; a lot of stuff is historical. Told some inside stuff that was funny, or I thought it was funny. We told a lot of the everyday stuff that nobody sees. We live every day, you laugh, you joke, you get sick, and you got family. I thought by doing it that way it would be something for people to read and that’s more down to earth. Something like, I would tell stories. I wrote it originally as if I was sitting at a bar, having drinks and having a conversation.

D: It comes across that way.

F: I wrote it originally just as I spoke, like having a conversation. There wasn’t a tell all as far as ratting on somebody. Made sure everybody was dead, and a couple of people, I just don’t talk about them. I don’t know how do to anything better than that, without doing nothing at all. Its honest, there is nothing fake about it. This is by somebody who lived it and experienced it.

D: You accomplished that, it’s so different.

 

THE PRESIDENT STREET BOYS comes out July 26, 2016 from Kensington.

*omertà is a code of honor that places importance on silence, non-cooperation with authorities, and non-interference in the illegal actions of others.