Simonetti was born in a poor family in Palma Campania, a town located at the foot of the Vesuvius in the hinterland of Naples about 25 km east of the city.

His criminal career started in the 1940s during World War II falsifying ration books for food which he then sold on the black market.

They imposed themselves as the protectors of the peasant farmers and shopkeepers, demanding in exchange the right to fix the price of products and control the business.

Weak modern market structures were regulated by violent mediators who imposed their own business rules.

[2] The coexistence between these three men was tumultuous, interspersed by conflicts over their respective areas of competence and resulting shoot-outs.

In the end Simonetti managed to prevail and became the sole price president in a market with a turnover of tens of billions of lire: the Campania region exported 30 per cent of the entire national fruit and vegetable production at the time.

Simonetti asked the young man, if he preferred spending ten thousand lire in flowers on his marriage or his funeral.

[8] He is often claimed to have slapped notorious American gangster Lucky Luciano in the face at the race track of Agnano; however, the actual perpetrator was Francesco Pirozzi, one of the men of Camorra boss Alfredo Maisto.

In 1953, Simonetti was imprisoned for 8 years and 3 months for the attempted murder and a shoot-out over territorial supremacy against a rival gang led by Alfredo Maisto in 1952.

Jealousy and fierce competition grew with "both believing that they ruled over the market district of Il Vasto" resulting in a violent war between the two.

[1] On 16 July 1955, at age 29, Simonetti was murdered in broad day light in the Corso Novara, the busy market place of Naples.

Holding it with both hands ("I was afraid I would miss," she explained later), she opened fire and killed Esposito in broad daylight.