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Antonio R. Caponigro aka "Tony Bananas" (January 22, 1912 - April 18, 1980 in Bronx, New York) was the consigliere of Angelo Bruno in the Philadelphia crime family.
Antonio Caponigro operated out of the Ironbound neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey. As a made member of the Philadelphia crime family in the 1950's and 1960's he became a recognized crime figure after identified by mob turncoat Joseph Valachi in 1959. During that time he served under capo Riccardo Biondi. He was the son of a wealthy banana merchant and was married twice, once to an Italian-American woman named Kathleen who died in 1980 and then married Toni Susan who he would be married to until his death in 1980, she would die of natural causes nine years after his murder. He rose in rank to become the Family Consigliere during the 1970s. Caponigro saw the end of the peaceful Angelo Bruno regime ending and decided to put the task upon himself to hasten it. Indictments for racketeering were being brought against the ailing Angelo, and there was no leadership in either the methamphetamine industry or casino gambling. Caponigro knew that he could count on the support of several key members of Bruno's administration after the don died.
Accordingly, Caponigro traveled to New York City to consult his friend Frank Tieri, from the Genovese crime family. Antonio Caponigro controlled a lucrative numbers operation in Newark, New Jersey, a holdover from the 1960s when New York had ceded parts of North Jersey to the Philadelphia crime family. Frank Tieri also had activities in the area, and he had challenged Caponigro's incursion. Antonio appealed the territorial dispute to the National Crime Syndicate, which, acting on Angelo Bruno's recommendation, ruled in favor of Caponigro. Antonio Caponigro approached Tieri with a plan to murder Bruno and take over the Philadelphia crime family. Tieri assured Caponigro that he would support him before the Commission. He returned to Philadelphia believing that his planned coup was now officially sanctioned. He recruited the support of his brother-in-law Alfred Salerno (no relation to mob turncoat Joseph Salerno or mob boss Anthony Salerno) and Bruno regime capos John Simone and Frank Sindone, and ordered the assassination.
When the Commission learned of Bruno's murder, Caponigro was summoned at once. He was told that the murder had not been sanctioned by the Commission, nor even considered by them. He turned helplessly to Frank Tieri, who sat in on the meeting. When he identified Tieri as the man who had authorized the murder, Tieri categorically denied it. The commission ruled that Caponigro had murdered a Commission member without authorization, and they sentenced him to death. Antonio Caponigro and his brother-in-law Alfred Salerno were taken to an isolated house in the mountains of upstate New York and tortured for days before finally being killed. Their bodies were later discovered in garbage bags in the South Bronx, naked and mutilated, with twenty dollar bills stuffed into their rectums as a sign that they had become too greedy. Frank Tieri was later given Caponigro's lucrative numbers operations in Newark, New Jersey.
The death of Angelo Bruno, his consigliere, and two capos threw the Philadelphia crime family wide open. With New York's blessing, Angelo Bruno's surviving underboss Phil Testa, was appointed the new boss. After Antonio murdered Bruno, Scarfo could return from his appointed exile in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Testa, now free of regulations broke the honored tradition and appointed narcotics trafficker Peter Casella as underboss and Nicky Scarfo as consigliere.
Sources
- The Plumber: The True Story of How One Good Man Destroyed the Entire Philadelphia Mafia by Joseph Salerno and Stephen J. Rivele
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Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 12 September 2008, at 01:17.
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