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Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to coast am on iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Matt. In your book The Life We Chose, you described

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Speaker 2: sort of the evolution of the mob families in that

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Speaker 2: part of Pennsylvania, and these mob bosses who emerged and

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Speaker 2: rose to prominence, say in the early nineteen hundreds in

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Speaker 2: these Italian communities, places like a Scranton and Pittston. They

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Speaker 2: weren't exactly folk heroes or benefactors or protectors. They explored

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Speaker 2: the hell out of other Italians, the Italian coal miners

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Speaker 2: right about. They extorted small businesses. I mean, they were

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Speaker 2: bad guys. It was only much later somebody like Russell

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Speaker 2: Buffalino becomes sort of admired, feared, but admired. Correct.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, they were brutal to the local communities in the

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Speaker 3: early nineteen hundreds, mostly through the mines, the coal mines there.

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Speaker 3: They took over the unions. They ran all the unions there,

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Speaker 3: all the coal unions, and if anyone ever pushed up

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Speaker 3: against them, and you'd see a lot of violence. Then

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Speaker 3: of course came bootlegging in the nineteen twenties. It was very,

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Speaker 3: very violent at that time. It wasn't until later when

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Speaker 3: Russell took over in the late nineteen forties, now, you know,

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Speaker 3: don't get me wrong, and they were still brutal and violent.

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Speaker 3: In fact, Russell was described in nineteen sixty two or

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Speaker 3: sixty three by USNIC Committee as being one of the

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Speaker 3: most powerful and violent members of organized crime in the country.

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Speaker 3: So Russell had and did his own share of violence too.

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Speaker 3: But there were a million stories of just kindnesses that

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Speaker 3: you know, Russell from Russell, whether it would be helping

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Speaker 3: out a business or even just helping out a neighbor

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Speaker 3: fix a roof or give them the money to do

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Speaker 3: something like that. So they turned. They did become sort

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Speaker 3: of like folk heroes more towards the fifties and sixties.

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Speaker 2: So there's Big Billy in his teens seeing Russell Buffalino

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Speaker 2: as associates, driving great cars, living a good life. They're

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Speaker 2: big shots. He comes to admire that, right Billy.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Billy does get into as he's reading the book,

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Speaker 3: you see this transformation. There were really two parts to

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Speaker 3: Billy's story. One was initially the first ten years or

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Speaker 3: so way he's an observer, he's just at Russell's hip

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Speaker 3: and he's watching everything. And then when Russell goes to

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Speaker 3: prison in the late nineteen seventies. That's when Billy becomes

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Speaker 3: a participant, and that's when his power and his influence grows.

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Speaker 3: And we see Billy and you know a number of

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Speaker 3: different scenes with a number of different people, you know,

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Speaker 3: including Donald Trump of all people. Right, But it was

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Speaker 3: through his relationship with Russell that led to those moments.

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Speaker 3: And Billy, did you know the thing? For Bill, there

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Speaker 3: were two things. Was a the relationship with Russell and

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Speaker 3: the world that Russell opened up for him. And it

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Speaker 3: was this incredible world where you are meeting celebrities, you're

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Speaker 3: meeting athletes, you're meeting politicians. It's a world he never ever,

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Speaker 3: ever would have been privy to had it not been

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Speaker 3: for Russell.

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Speaker 2: You described the rise of Buffalino in the mafia. How

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Speaker 2: it is that he came to know all these key

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Speaker 2: players all over the country. I guess from the early

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Speaker 2: days of bootlegging is where he made associations with a

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Speaker 2: lot of the ones who became prominent mafia bosses.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, he did so, Russell. Russell was very, very smart.

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Speaker 3: The one thing I've always heard about Russell was he

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Speaker 3: was a brilliant man and he probably actually most likely

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Speaker 3: would have been accomplished in any sort of business or

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Speaker 3: industry he had set his mind to. In this case,

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Speaker 3: he happened to be a member of organized crime. But

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Speaker 3: he was very smart, knew how to handle people. And

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Speaker 3: even though you know, we talked a little bit about

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Speaker 3: some of the flashier parts of life in that world,

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Speaker 3: you know, Russell was very low key. His house we did,

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Speaker 3: I did all the interviews with Billy Buffalino's old house

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Speaker 3: in Kingston, Pennsylvania. When Russell Russell died in ninety four.

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Speaker 3: His wife died in two thousand and six. When she

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Speaker 3: passed away, she left the house to Billy's son, who

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Speaker 3: happens to be named Russell. And so we ended up

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Speaker 3: doing every single interview in the whole Buffalo home. And

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Speaker 3: it's just it's a ranch style home and a nondescript

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Speaker 3: neighborhood in Kingston, Pennsylvania. And it's actually it looks as

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Speaker 3: if it looks like it did back in the nineteen

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Speaker 3: seventies with the furniture and whatnot. It's like a museum

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Speaker 3: piece right now. But Russell was not showy. He lived

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Speaker 3: by that code. He tried to instill that in Bill,

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Speaker 3: and Bill ended up living in the same house. He's

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Speaker 3: still in the same house that he's lived in for

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Speaker 3: about forty years.

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Speaker 2: That's amazing. So from what you describe in this book,

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Speaker 2: I know you wrote on a whole other book about Buffalino.

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Speaker 2: But he had his fingers in a lot of different

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Speaker 2: businesses what appeared to be legit business that also became

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Speaker 2: fronts for other things that he was doing. Can you

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Speaker 2: describe some of those.

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Speaker 3: He was big well, obviously he was thinking things like gambling.

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Speaker 3: He was also big though in northeastern Pennsylvania in dress manufacturing.

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Speaker 3: He owned the factories that made the dresses for the

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Speaker 3: New York companies. You know, Russell spent four days a

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Speaker 3: week in New York. He had an apartment in New

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Speaker 3: York that he had maintained for many, many years. And

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Speaker 3: so he had his hands not just in trst manufacturing.

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Speaker 3: He had his hands in jewelry, He had his hands

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Speaker 3: in loan sharking. He has his hands in many businesses,

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Speaker 3: and of course, as I mentioned earlier, he had his

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Speaker 3: hands in the Teamsters Union. But Russell was also Russell

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Speaker 3: was also known as you know, the mobs Negotiator, which

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Speaker 3: was a title that Billy picked up later, where Russell

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Speaker 3: would be called and to settle all kinds of disagreements,

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Speaker 3: but not just on the East coast, but also on

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Speaker 3: the West coast, in the South, in Florida. He spent

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Speaker 3: a lot of time down in Miami and Fort Lauderdale,

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Speaker 3: hit two houses.

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Speaker 2: Down there, and Cuba.

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Speaker 3: And in Cuba in the nineteen fifties, which was his

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Speaker 3: situation in Cuba when Cuba was taken over by cash Show,

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Speaker 3: Russell had fled and he left behind a million dollars.

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Speaker 3: And it was that million dollars that set the stage

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Speaker 3: for his recruitment as I written a book by the

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Speaker 3: CIA and he's so called mafia plots that later came

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Speaker 3: to play a role in the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa.

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Speaker 2: You know, I didn't know until reading this book that

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Speaker 2: these Bob guys Buffalino had given financial support to Castro.

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Speaker 2: I know that they had, you know, I knew that

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Speaker 2: that historically they had had sort of sealed their fate

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Speaker 2: by siding with Batista, But I didn't know they gave

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Speaker 2: financial support to Castro as sort of to cover their

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Speaker 2: bases in case he took over.

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Speaker 3: I did realized that either I had heard of it.

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Speaker 3: I didn't realize just how deeply that went. Russell had

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Speaker 3: been close to Batista, and he had been so close

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Speaker 3: to him that he would bring Batista's kids up to

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Speaker 3: Pennsylvania for the summer under his protection. But when things

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Speaker 3: went south for Batista, they did play the other side

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Speaker 3: with Fidel and not just with money, but with arms.

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Speaker 3: There were scenes in the book where there were arms

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Speaker 3: that were going heading to Cuba from Pittsburgh. Russell had

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Speaker 3: te ties in Pittsburgh friends there, so but of course

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Speaker 3: Castro was playing with the mob too and had no

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Speaker 3: intentions of ever letting them get their casinos back, which

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Speaker 3: led to all kinds of turbulence in the late fifties

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Speaker 3: early in nineteen sixties.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, this imagery is right out of Godfather too. So

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Speaker 2: the real life guy's Meyer, Lanski, Modelitz Santostrau, Picante, Carlos Marcello,

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Speaker 2: all those guys have interest in those casinos and it

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Speaker 2: was like a gold mine. It was, it was perfect

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Speaker 2: for him, and then they lose it all and it

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Speaker 2: leads to all kinds of plots and conspiracies that came

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Speaker 2: to bite back to bite everyone. You know, Castro becomes

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Speaker 2: a target of CIA plots, to murderm and the mob

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Speaker 2: gets involved, and can you describe some of that?

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Speaker 3: So Russell Russell, the CIA learned that Russell had left

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Speaker 3: behind a million dollars when he fled in nineteen fifty nine,

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Speaker 3: and they are in the midst of their plans. You know,

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Speaker 3: the CIA at that time was just a rogue agency

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Speaker 3: that took orders from no one, and so they had

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Speaker 3: recruited it actually recruited two sets of organized crime figures.

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Speaker 3: But in this case they had reached out to Jimmy

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Speaker 3: hoffa tou They knew half of his friends with Buffaloo.

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Speaker 3: It was half of who reached out to Buffalino, and

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Speaker 3: Buffalino agreed to help them. Basically his help was in

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Speaker 3: terms of surveillance and helping them with geography and roads.

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Speaker 3: But it was leave for the assassination of Fidel Castro

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Speaker 3: as well as the Bay of Pigs invasion. And when

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Speaker 3: the Bay of Pigs invasion did the way it did,

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Speaker 3: members of organized client people like Russell, were furious because

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Speaker 3: they thought, because they were printing money in Cuba, it

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Speaker 3: was a gold mine and if they had lost it,

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Speaker 3: and they felt that they were going to get it back,

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Speaker 3: and they did it. So they were very angry, very angry,

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Speaker 3: and it did set the stage for a lot of speculation,

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Speaker 3: you know, with the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers and

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Speaker 3: who was involved and was the mob involved? And Billy

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Speaker 3: and I talked about it, and Billy did have some

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Speaker 3: answers to this. It wasn't necessarily definitive enough for me

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Speaker 3: to want to include it in a book, you know,

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Speaker 3: unless he knew exactly who the shooters were. I wasn't

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Speaker 3: really going to put it in anyway. I didn't want

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Speaker 3: it because the book was so rich. I didn't want

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Speaker 3: to take away from it, right, I didn't want it.

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Speaker 3: I didn't want people looking in and go up, there's

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Speaker 3: just another conspiracy theory.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I did want to ask you about that.

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Speaker 2: I could imagine that you would avoid that conversation. Did

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Speaker 2: you have to approach that kind of gingerly?

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Speaker 3: No, we were just talking about it, and he had

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Speaker 3: answers for it, and I just you know, which may

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Speaker 3: come out at another time. It's not they're not definitive,

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Speaker 3: but it does side with one particular theory involving the mob,

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Speaker 3: and so it was interesting, but it wasn't. I just

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Speaker 3: did not I just not feel comfortable with including it

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Speaker 3: in the book. I mean the book is it's I

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Speaker 3: wanted the book to be more about his first hand accounts,

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Speaker 3: is what he saw, what he did, which is you

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Speaker 3: know how the book basically rolls out. And this was

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Speaker 3: more about things that some other things that Russell had

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Speaker 3: spoken to him about. You have to remember also, these

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Speaker 3: weren't like conversations that he would have it with Russell,

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Speaker 3: Especially in the beginning, you never ask questions, you know,

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Speaker 3: if you're riding he's driving Russell in the car, and

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Speaker 3: he never asked questions about business. Us. Who wants to

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Speaker 3: tell you something, he will tell you something. You know.

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Speaker 3: It became much later on where those conversations became more

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Speaker 3: two way conversations.

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Speaker 2: You do touch on sort of the plots to kill

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Speaker 2: Castro and how the CIA did recruit the mob to

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Speaker 2: do this. There were some meetings I've reported on on myself,

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Speaker 2: meetings here in Las Vegas set up by a guy

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Speaker 2: named Robert Mayhew used to work with the FBI and

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Speaker 2: Sam g and Conna, Johnny ROSSELLI or they got together

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Speaker 2: here and started talking about how to do it, and

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Speaker 2: then there's it almost gets into comedy about some of

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Speaker 2: the attempts that were made on Castro's life and how

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Speaker 2: they tried to make his beard fall out and poisonous food,

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Speaker 2: and none of those ever happened. And it raises a

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Speaker 2: lot of speculation whether those attempts on Castro might have

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Speaker 2: inspired Castro or or the mob itself to go ahead

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Speaker 2: and kill JFK RFK. We do know that Johnny Roselli

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Speaker 2: got killed, Sam g and Conna got killed. Do you

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Speaker 2: think that was because they what they knew about these

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Speaker 2: various plots and they might spill the beans.

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Speaker 3: So this takes us to nineteen seventy five in Jimmy

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Speaker 3: Haffe's disappearance in the Church Committee, the Senate committee that

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Speaker 3: was investigating these CIA mafia plots. You know, up until

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Speaker 3: June seventy five, Halfa had wanted to take over his

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Speaker 3: union again after getting out of prison in seventy one,

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Speaker 3: and he and Russell had been very very good friends.

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Speaker 3: In Russell and others told Haafa to sit back, don't

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Speaker 3: do it, because the mob with the union was in

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Speaker 3: different hands right now, and everyone, meaning the mobsters, were

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Speaker 3: comfortable with it. They didn't want half It to come back,

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Speaker 3: but Hafa insisted, and so it was Russell that kept

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Speaker 3: Jimmy Hoffer alive because other people wanted him gone. But

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Speaker 3: it was in June of nineteen seventy five when Time

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Speaker 3: magazine outed Russell with a story about his involvement in

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Speaker 3: the CIA mafia plots that were being investigated, and it

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Speaker 3: was the first time Russell had been connected to them publicly.

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Speaker 3: And so what happened within almost rapid fire, was two

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Speaker 3: weeks after Russell was how did by Time magazine? Uh

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Speaker 3: Sam g and Conna disappears, Jimmy Hoffa disappears four weeks later,

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Speaker 3: and then the following year, Johnny ROSELLI disappears. And so

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Speaker 3: I talked to Billy about it, and you know, we

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Speaker 3: talked about what happened with Hafa, and you know, there

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Speaker 3: was a meeting that he had gone to and who

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Speaker 3: and who was involved in that meeting And I said

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Speaker 3: to him and he didn't. He loved to this day,

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Speaker 3: he loves Russell. And I said, was Russell involved in

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Speaker 3: any of this? And he's in his first reaction would

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Speaker 3: be no. And then when we pushed, I pushed a

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Speaker 3: little bit. I'm like, well, could these guys have done

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Speaker 3: anything regarding Halfa or anyone else? If Russell didn't give

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Speaker 3: his blessing, and so Russell had to be involved.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, yeah, there's no way that the mob kills

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Speaker 2: Haffa without Russell Buffalino sign it off.

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Speaker 3: On it correct, because because of just how close they were,

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Speaker 3: and more importantly, because of how powerful Russell was. But

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Speaker 3: this the the what I did learn and what's in

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Speaker 3: the book was the person who was the source for

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Speaker 3: these stories about Russell being involved in the CIA mafia

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Speaker 3: plots was a former CIA agent who leaked the information

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Speaker 3: to Time magazine as well as the UH to a

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Speaker 3: newspaper up in northern California. And I did speak to

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Speaker 3: the reporter who wrote that story UH, and you know,

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Speaker 3: he told me who he told me who his source was,

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Speaker 3: and I was kind of blown away. I didn't realize

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Speaker 3: it was a CIA source that gave him that information.

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Speaker 2: So the other mob guys that got rubbed out, they

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Speaker 2: weren't the leak.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, Russell thought he was going to be subpoena.

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Speaker 3: And we also spoke to a member of one of

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Speaker 3: the surviving members of the Church Committee investigation team, and

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Speaker 3: they said that Russell was not going to from what

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Speaker 3: he could remember or Russell wasn't going to be subpoened.

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Speaker 3: So Russell basically acted, was acting with caution. He you know,

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Speaker 3: it wasn't that he knew he was going to be subpoenaed.

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Speaker 3: He thought he was going to be at the end

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Speaker 3: of the day, he wasn't going to be.

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Speaker 2: I can see somebody saying, well, why take a chance.

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Speaker 3: These guys, Yeah, well that's how That's how they thought

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Speaker 3: in those days, why take a chance, And that's basically

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Speaker 3: how they lived. So it was fascinating in terms of

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Speaker 3: how Billy described things. It was fascinating in terms of

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Speaker 3: learning some of these other who some of these other

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Speaker 3: sources were and I didn't know about. And it kinds

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Speaker 3: of and the joy is a really full picture in

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Speaker 3: terms of or fuller picture. We don't know who pulled

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Speaker 3: the trigger to kill Jimmy Hoffa, but we do know

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Speaker 3: now who ordered it in that it was Tony Provenzano

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Speaker 3: and Anthony Sillerno from New York with the blessing of

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Speaker 3: Russell Buffalino. And we also know who didn't kill Jimmy Hoffa,

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Speaker 3: which was Frank Sharing according to Billy, because going to

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Speaker 3: Bill that was complete fiction and Bill actually had proof

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Speaker 3: of that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we have about two minutes before we

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Speaker 2: go to a break, So I want to jump into

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Speaker 2: The Irishman the Frank Scheron story, because we've covered it

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Speaker 2: here on this program before, but we don't have time

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Speaker 2: to do it. I do want to ask you about

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Speaker 2: the portrayal of Russell Buffalino in The Irishman, other than

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Speaker 2: the murder of Hafa, because I would think it was

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Speaker 2: he came up pretty well in that. I mean, as

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Speaker 2: a man who's was wisdom, had wisdom and was respected.

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Speaker 2: I would think that that part of the portrayal would

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Speaker 2: have been okay with Big Billy.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Billy didn't necessarily have any issues with the performance.

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Speaker 3: What he did have an issue with was how Russell

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Speaker 3: was perceived. He didn't come off as being this all

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Speaker 3: powerful boss. He kind of came off as being in

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Speaker 3: almost an underlink to some of the other bosses like

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Speaker 3: in Philadelphia and in New York, and that grated arm Bill.

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Speaker 3: But the thing that really bothered him the most was

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Speaker 3: Frank she and Frank Sharon's story. You know, that was

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Speaker 3: something that he very much wanted to set the record

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Speaker 3: straight on.

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Speaker 2: You're write in your book about one point the FEDS

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Speaker 2: some documents that they had where they describe Buffalino as

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Speaker 2: an underboss to one of the other mob guys, which

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Speaker 2: really graded on everybody who knew him.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, even Laurenforcement didn't get it right, as you seeing

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Speaker 3: the book, and he didn't get it right for many,

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Speaker 3: many years. And it's just a testament to the Mob

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Speaker 3: being able to keep some things quiet and secretive. It's

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Speaker 3: very hard trying to pierce that world. But as far

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Speaker 3: as you know, they were successful in some areas with

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Speaker 3: some families, but with the Buffalinos, it was never any

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Speaker 3: definitive information. And frankly, this is really the first time

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Speaker 3: we get to see what was going on with that family.

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Speaker 2: A lot of great information, first time I've heard a

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Speaker 2: lot of this stuff in the life We Chose by

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Speaker 2: Matt Burkback about the last secrets of America's most powerful

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Speaker 2: mafia family.

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Speaker 1: Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at

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Speaker 1: one am Eastern, and go to Coast to Coast am

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