On October 31, 1975, Michael Franzese entered a room with an upper mob boss sitting at the head of a horseshoe table, with lower heads to his left and right. Michael, then 24, walked over to them and held out his hand, where they cut off his finger with a knife.
His blood shed a card placed in the cup of his hands, which represented a saint, which was then set on fire. “‘Michael Franzese, you have been born again in a new life, Cosa Nostra.
“Violate what you know of this life, betray your brethren, and you will die and burn in hell as the saint burns in your hands. Do you accept? ‘ And I said, ‘Yes, I do,’ “said Michael, now 71 Manchester Evening News.
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“It is a night I will never forget. When you take the Oath of Omertà, an oath of silence, you don’t even have to admit the existence of this life, and you can never betray life.
“It’s not an oath that says ‘you’re going to kill, steal and kill tonight.’
At the height of his mafia life as the “caporegime” (captain) of the revered Colombo criminal family that ran the New York Mafia along with five other families, Michael Franzese swindled the U.S. federal government for more $ 350 million with a gasoline smuggling scheme. making him one of the most powerful men in the city and a prime target for law enforcement.
In 1986, Vanity Fair named Michael one of the biggest money earners the mafia had ever seen since Al Capone, with Fortune magazine placing him at number 18 on the list “Fifty Richest Mafia Leaders” and powerful. “
His life was as seen in the movies, he says, where Joseph Bono played him briefly in the famous Martin Scorsese film Goodfellas. When he was twenty, Michael had his own plane, a Bell helicopter, a 7,000-square-foot house on two acres of land on Long Island, a water house in Florida, and a beach house in California.
Michael and his father Sonny, 101 (Image: supplied)
He had a team of 300 men working under him, contributing $ 8 million a week. “I was at a club every night, we had a lot of parties, we had a lot of fun,” says Michael.
“She also had a legitimate business, a production company, a lot of things going on. I was lucky and knew how to use life to my advantage in business. On the other hand, I was arrested 18 times, charged seven times and with a large crew under me, I would be there if anyone got in trouble.
“As long as I make that money, I spend it on lawyers, in the courts, and it’s part of my life. It was very fast; there was never a boring moment. “And he adds:” The mafia is not a business, it’s a whole way of life. We have our own rules, policies, it’s a part of you; and the soul to survive. ”
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It was a challenge for Michael to be able to trust new faces, to have to walk very carefully. “You had to be aware at all times that someone could hurt you,” he explains.
“I had a couple of undercover investigations on me … I had two undercover agents with me for about eight months. They made 83 recordings of me, and they couldn’t use any of them.
“I never put myself in a position where they could. They tried to charge me after almost a year of investigation and they couldn’t. I was so careful with people I wasn’t sure about.”
In 1995, after several years in prison for extradition charges, Michael’s life changed. Guided by a new faith in God, he decided to publicly turn his back on the mob.
Sonny Franzese at 101 and 50 (Image: supplied)
What followed were several contracts on his life, including one approved by his own father, high-profile deputy chief Sonny Franzese, who was released from prison after forty years in 2017 at the age of 100 and died ago. two years at 103.
“It hurts. My dad and I were very close, but I got it too,” says Michael. “If I became an important witness and put people in jail, well my father proposed to me [to join the Mafia]so it also puts him in danger.
“I think my dad would have shot me in the head? No.” He added: “We fixed it later.”
Michael describes his father as his growing “idol”. But he was always in the media, which caused him to quarrel at school when his classmates were commenting.
“We had a lot of his men around who respected him, I looked at him. But originally he didn’t want this life for me.
“I wanted him to go to school, he told me‘ son, be a doctor, get an education ’, and so I was on that path until he had serious problems in the 60s. He was charged four times, three times in the one in New York State for serious crimes, but was tried and acquitted, but then charged in federal court, for directing a series of bank robberies across the country, and was sentenced to 50 years of prison.
“When he left to make his time in 1970, I was 19 years old, a pre-medical student and devastated because I was 50 when he came in. I thought he would never come out alive. Joe Colombo was the head of our family. , I knew him well, he took me under his wing and I began to meet many friends of my father.
“They said, ‘If you don’t help him, he’s going to die in prison,’ and that’s what brought me to the streets. The best way to help him was to become a member of his life.”
Michael does not look back with regret on the chosen path, but is remorseful for the “inescapable violence and destruction” that has taken hold. He has asked for a “sincere repentance” from God, whom he turned to when he was locked up in a solitary 6 x 9 foot cell, where he was housed for 29 months.
Michael during his first stay in prison in 1986 with his wife Camille and their first child Miquelle (Image: supplied)
“I deepened my faith and it kept me going and made me decide to go out and change my life,” she reflects. “When you only have time, and it’s you and God in a prison cell, you say ‘okay, I want to learn all I can about you, I want to see if that’s real.'”
Michael had his 37-year-old wife, Camille Garcia, a devout Christian, send him books to prison. She had met him when she was a dancer in one of her films and says there was an instant attraction.
He had a powerful influence on Michael, and the desire to be with her eventually drove him to leave his previous life behind. “When I fell in love with her, I said, ‘If I marry this girl and stay in this life, she’ll be alone.’ to choose; it was her or life and I chose her, “says Michael.
“This started my whole journey in a different way. Before I was married as a child, we had three children in three years, with Camille, we have four, so I have seven children. Five daughters and two sons.
“This life is so destructive to families. My whole family was destroyed as a result of my father’s involvement in that life. I didn’t want to do this to my family, I just couldn’t do it.”
When he was released from prison, he and his family moved directly to California to start again. He sent a message to his father saying that it was over and that he would not hurt anyone.
Michael’s wife was finally the reason he left the mob (Image: supplied)
Michael cut ties making sure he didn’t create patterns of behavior. “I didn’t walk my dog at 7 in the morning every morning, so the people watching me knew where I was, I didn’t go to the same restaurant on a Tuesday night. I was very disciplined.
“Everyone thought it would be a great witness, but that never happened. I just survived everyone and I never sell my former partners. Everyone I ran with is dead or in jail.”
He denies living in fear and instead argues that he lives with caution. “It’s my natural instinct. I tell my daughters, ‘When you’re in a parking lot, make sure you look around,’ I think that’s your way of life. ‘
For the past 25 years, Michael has been sharing his tips as a motivational speaker and has been working to inspire vulnerable youth and adults against a life of organized crime. In the summer, he embarks on a tour of the United Kingdom – An Evening with Michael Franzese – The Real Goodfella – with a show in Manchester, where he will reveal unexplained truths.
When asked if he has a message for those involved in gang culture in Greater Manchester, Michael says, “I have a lot of stories. The important part of the story is that I was able to overcome a bad situation.
“People with challenges in their lives should realize that there is always a way out. These young people are wondering ‘how can we leave?’ I say, “Hey, I got away from the biggest, most organized gang in the world.” I can do it, you can do it.
“It gives people hope and encouragement. That’s what we hope to do every time they talk. There could be a happy ending to everything you’re going through.”
Tickets for the Manchester show – An Evening with Michael Franzese – The Real Goodfella – on August 5 at the Mercure Manchester Piccadilly Hotel, Portland Street, are now on sale. For more details, visit
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