Joseph Bonanno

Bonanno crime family

The Bonanno crime family is one of the "Five Families" that dominates organized crime activities in New York City, United States, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra).

Founded and named after Joseph Bonanno, for over 30 years the family was one of the most powerful in the country. However, in the early 1960s, Bonanno attempted to seize the mantle of boss of bosses, but failed and was forced to retire. This touched off a period of turmoil within the family that lasted almost a quarter-century. It was the first of the New York families to be kicked off the Commission (a council of the bosses that helps to maintain order in the Mafia), due to infighting for the boss's mantle and allegations the family was actively dealing heroin. Later, the family faced shaky leadership, with the acting boss Carmine Galante murdered in 1979 at the command of Philip Rastelli, the actual boss. The family only recovered in the 1990s under Joseph Massino, and by the dawn of the new millennium was not only back on the Commission, but was the most powerful family in New York. There were also two major setbacks: in 1981, they learned that an FBI agent calling himself Donnie Brasco had infiltrated their ranks; and in 2004, a rash of convictions and defections culminated in Massino becoming a government informant.