[1] During the Prohibition era, Lonardo's father and uncles were involved in a gang war with the Porrello brothers over control of sugar distribution to regional bootleggers.

On June 11, 1929, the 18-year-old Lonardo and his cousin, Dominic Sospirato, shot and killed Salvatore "Black Sam" Todaro at a cigar store owned by the Porrellos at the corner of East 110th Street and Woodland Avenue.

[3] In February 1932, Lonardo was questioned by police over the murders of Raymond and Rosario Porello and one of their underlings, Dominic Gueli, who had also been shot dead in a cigar store.

[6] As a family soldier, Lonardo was designated with collecting protection money from casinos in Northern Kentucky and Western Pennsylvania, and he eventually worked his way up to underboss in 1976.

[8] Lonardo and Jimmy Fratianno, the acting boss of the Los Angeles crime family, were the highest-ranking mobsters to become federal witnesses until Gambino underboss Sammy "the Bull" Gravano during the early 1990s.