After Zerilli was convicted and imprisoned in 1974, his father came out of retirement to lead the organization until his death in 1977, when Jack Tocco became head of the Partnership.
At the time of Tony's birth, his father was an up-and-coming member of the Eastside Mob under the direction of Angelo Meli and his cousin and brother-in-law Vito William Tocco.
Although listed as the number one man in the Hazel Park operation, Zerilli is thought to have deferred to his cousin Jack Tocco in business dealings.
Hazel Park was such a financial success that in August 1970 Zerilli, Tocco, and Dominic "Fats" Corrado decided to develop another race track.
But the second project, to be called Hazel Park South, was cancelled after Zerilli ran into legal problems in Las Vegas.
With this revenue, Zerilli invested in several other businesses, including the Spaghetti Palace restaurant, established in 1968 near the Macomb Mall in Roseville, Michigan.
During the early 1960s, Zerilli began spending a good portion of his time in Las Vegas, where various Mob families from the East had invested.
Zerilli and Michael Polizzi approached mob "connection man" "Handsome Johnny" Roselli about buying a casino.
Zerilli and Polizzi eventually gained access to the casino when the Commission approved former municipal judge Arthur Rooks, from Hamtramck, Michigan; and Irving Shapiro, owner of the Toledo Hotel, as key operators in the Frontier.
Friedman later testified that he was set up in the Frontier to oversee the development and financing on orders from Zerilli and other unseen Partnership members from Detroit.
As a result, Zerilli, Polizzi, Jack Shapiro and lawyer Peter J. Bellanca were convicted of skimming approximately $250,000 a month from the Frontier for more than two years.
But on March 15, 1996, Zerilli, Jack Tocco, and 15 other alleged Partnership members and associates were indicted on a 25-count federal charge of violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO).
In November 2007 he was serving the final months of his sentence in a halfway house in the Detroit area, with projected release date April 6, 2008.
[4] Zerilli said in the Santia NBC report that "they" intended to move the body to a permanent grave in the upstate Rogers City area, but that Hoffa's remains were never reinterred.
[citation needed] At the time of Hoffa's disappearance, Zerilli had been in prison after being convicted on charges related to Las Vegas casino skimming.
"[citation needed] On June 17, 2013, Detroit media outlets reported that the FBI was in the process of excavating a large tract of the Buell Road parcel in Oakland County.
[8] On January 16, 2013, The Macomb Daily reported that Zerilli had spoken about Hoffa not only to create interest in his actions but as a result of a growing rift between Jack Tocco, the head of the family, and him.
Quoted in the Daily's report, former U.S. Attorney Keith Corbett said, “There is a good deal of acrimony between Tony and his cousin, Jack...and the resentment goes both ways.