Milwaukee crime family

[4] The first known Mafia boss of Milwaukee was Vito Guardalabene, who immigrated to the United States from Santa Flavia, Sicily in 1903 and became naturalized U.S. citizen in 1911.

[3] Prior to his retirement, Vallone had groomed Salvatore "Sam" Ferrara, a relative and fellow native of Prizzi, to succeed him as boss of the Milwaukee family.

[3] In November or December 1952, a panel of senior mobsters from Chicago responsible for overseeing the Milwaukee family, including Tony Accardo, Rocco Fischetti and Sam Giancana, ruled that Ferrara had abused his position and demoted him, installing Balistrieri's father-in-law, John Alioto, as the new boss.

In 1954, John DiTrapani, a relative and godson of Sam Ferrara, along with Frank LoGalbo and Jack Enea, plotted to seize control of the family from Alioto.

[5] At the time he became boss, Balistrieri was overseeing a lucrative loansharking racket, held a monopoly over illegal sports betting in Milwaukee, and also had significant influence in the vending machine business.

Balistrieri caused discontent in the family by promoting the newly-arrived Gurera to the rank of capodecina as well as abolishing the sagia process and ruling in an autocratic fashion.

[3] On September 11, 1975, Milwaukee mobster and FBI informant August Maniaci was shot and killed outside his home on the city's East Side after feuding with Balistrieri.

[12] His brother, Vincent Maniaci, survived an attempted car bombing in August 1977 when twenty sticks of dynamite attached to his Buick Electra failed to explode.

[18] Initially unaware that "Conte" was under the protection of the Bonanno family, Balistrieri allegedly assigned three men to kill Cobb because he had entered the vending business without his permission.

[19] Frank Balistrieri along with his two sons Joseph and John worked with Bonanno crime family capo Michael Sabella, and soldier Benjamin Ruggiero in extorting Best Vending Company from May 1978 to February 1979.

[18] Fifteen members and associates of the Milwaukee and Bonanno families, including Balistrieri and his sons, were indicted by a federal grand jury on October 1, 1980 at the culmination of the FBI's three-year investigation.

[23] Simultaneous to the investigation into the vending business in Milwaukee, the FBI was also conducting Operation Strawman, a multi-state racketeering probe which focused on organized crime's infiltration of the casino industry in Las Vegas.

Operation Strawman began in May 1978 and was carried out with the cooperation of the Justice Department's Organized Crime Strike Force as well as state and local law enforcement agencies.

[26] The Strawman investigation resulted in the convictions of nineteen senior mobsters and virtually eliminated the leadership of the crime families in Milwaukee, Chicago and Kansas City.