Former Springfield sports bookmaker Chicky Ciccatelli returns to Gangland Wire for a candid conversation about organized crime, illegal sports betting, federal prison, and rebuilding his life.
Host Gary Jenkins sits down with Chicky as he prepares for a live appearance in Las Vegas to better understand how traditional bookmakers operated before the era of legalized sports betting. Chicky explains how he entered the gambling business after a Navy injury and eventually worked for Adolfo “Big Al” Bruno, a powerful Genovese crime family figure in Springfield, Massachusetts.
The discussion takes listeners inside the day-to-day operations of a Mafia-connected sportsbook. Chicky explains how bookmakers set betting lines, balanced action on both sides of games, managed betting limits, collected debts, and dealt with the constant pressure of large wagers. He also discusses the overlap between sports betting and loan-sharking, and how experienced bettors attempted to exploit changing betting lines.
Beyond gambling, Chicky shares an inspiring personal story of survival. After nearly dying from heart failure and other serious health complications, he completely transformed his lifestyle—losing more than 200 pounds through diet and exercise while committing himself to family, faith, and sobriety.
The conversation also explores Chicky’s unexpected acting career, including his appearance in The Featherweight, the acclaimed Willie Pep boxing film, and his experiences attending movie premieres and working alongside professional actors.
This episode offers a rare insider’s look at Mafia bookmaking, federal investigations, organized crime, and the possibility of redemption after prison.
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Transcript
[0:00] Hey guys, this is retired intelligence unit detective Gary Jenkins back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I have former Springfield, Massachusetts area
[0:09] sports bookie, Chicky Cecchetelli.. We spoke a few years back, didn’t we, Chicky? Several years ago, yes. And he has some major changes in his life since then. I’m getting ready to do a live podcast at a convention in Las Vegas on August the 6th. It’s called Bet Bash. And if any of you guys are interested in sports gambling. It’s all about sports gambling. And the guy got hold of me and asked me if I’d go out and do a podcast, a live podcast for some of the people that are going to the convention. And I said, yeah, I did get a hotel room out of him. I got to pay my own way out the airfare, but I wanted to go out anyhow and see a couple of people out there. So I thought I need to learn a little more about sports book. I know a little bit, just enough to be dangerous. I want to talk to an expert. The first thing I did, guys, I went through a couple of friends of mine. I know there’s a guy out here that was a longtime sports bookie. He did some time for it. And he supposedly is a Christian now and he’s reformed and all that. So I sent word to him through two different guys that were friends of his. They said, hey, he’d just like to talk to you. Just tell him what it’s like. He won’t even record it. I never did hear from him. He just kind of, oh, okay. So I guess he doesn’t want to talk to me, but I know Chicky does. And Chicky, I really appreciate you coming back on the show and helping me with that. It’s really great to talk to you again.
[1:26] Absolutely, Gary. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. We talked on the phone the other day. A lot of things have happened since the last time we talked about three or four years ago. I have to remark that you are the new slim and trim Chicky from what I remember from before.
[1:40] Great tan too, dude. So what happened there? What happened? Tell us about that. January 1st of this year, I got sick. I was very overweight. I wasn’t in shape. And I had a close call with death. I was a test of heart failure. And I just made a conscious decision and I said I’m going to get healthy and I’m going to lose weight I’m going to start working out and that was almost seven months ago I was retaining water my liver was messed up it was bad so I went to the hospital for about a month, and I went into a rehab where they get you back on your feet and you learn how to walk and everything and I just started eating carbs, under 12 to 1400 calories a day working out I got a pool in my place swimming every day, weights in the morning, eating healthy, I eat clean. And I lost over 200 pounds already. I got another probably 80 to go and I’ll be at my Navy weight. When I was in the Navy, I was hired from the military.
[2:34] Oh, wow. Through the grace of God. Yeah, through the grace of God, it brought me back better than ever. Yeah, really, yeah. But for that, you’d be dead now. It’s just not worth it. Absolutely. And I promise you, you’ll feel better. You’ll feel better about everything, about everything. I got five grandchildren, little grandchildren from two to five. I want to be around for them. I want to coach their soccer team. And I want to go to the different events and go on vacations with them. It was either wake up or it was like they say that saying, and live to die or live down a great life. And I chose, knock on wood, thank God, grace to God, I chose to help me and I’m doing it. All right, great. Just keep it up, man. It’ll pay you back. It’ll pay you back. Especially those kids, those grandkids. Those grandkids like to have their grandpa around. I promise you, I’ve got three of them. They’re all adults now. I’m starting to get great grandkids,
[3:21] but they like having their grandpa around and it’s important to be around for them. So you were in a movie since then. You were telling me about it a little bit. So I looked it up and this movie is called The Featherway. It’s a boxing movie and it looked like you may be playing a promoter or something. I couldn’t tell exactly what it was, but I noticed that I got a great review from the New Yorker magazine. Now, guys, if you get a review from the New Yorker magazine, that’s good. That means it’s a pretty good movie. Now, I don’t know. I don’t know. I couldn’t seem to find it anywhere, but I know how movies, they come and go. There’s so many movies out there. Sometimes they’re really hard to find because all these different rights. So I’m not sure if it’s even still out there. What was that about?
[4:00] It was about Willie Pepp, a professional boxer, I believe 236 professional fights out of Hartford, Connecticut. James Matteo was the star to play Willie Pepp just like him. He was in Band of Brothers. He was in The Offer. He was in a lot of movies. He was in with Robin Williams back in the day, Hook. He was in The Basketball Diaries with Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Wahlberg when he was a kid. He’s friends with Leonardo DiCaprio, and his production house is called Apian Way Productions.
[4:30] Leonardo DiCaprio was part of it. His team did all the productions. He wasn’t in the movie. He was definitely a big part of it. And like you’ve seen, we were laughing the other day, I’m in the trailer. They put me in the trailer, which I was thrilled. Yeah, the movie’s great. It’s got all streaming platforms. It was in the movie theater. It came out about two years ago, a year and a half ago. Now it’s on the streaming platforms. And another guy, Jay Geong, he’s an actor in LA from Boston, from my area. He was in all the movies about Whitey Bulger, Black Mask, all the different movies with DiCaprio and Ben Affleck and all them. He’s a friend of mine. We know each other. And he said, come on, chicken, come down to Hartford and try out. I brought a dear friend of mine, Ryan Hoyle, who’s done probably about 18 years in federal prison. And it’s basically, they wanted real guys in there that were in prison, that know the streets. They wanted to play street guy roles in the movie. So it was our first time we ever were. We did one other thing in 2018, 19 in New York, and it was a really good thing. But Thank you. Technical difficulties. It might still come out. Who knows? I don’t know. But yeah, so we did the movie and we went to the premiere in New York, went to another premiere in Hartford, Connecticut.
[5:38] All the people were there, the stars, everything. We were right there. It was an incredible experience, Gary. Incredible. We just, we were laughing through the whole thing because we were like, Jesus, several years ago, a few years ago, we’re in federal prison and now we’re on a movie set watching us on a movie on a big screen. It was just so surreal. It was a great experience. And now, because of that, we’re piggybacking on that movie for other movies. James Maddiel reached out and said, Chicky, we’re going to use you again. So it’s just get your foot in the door. And we got our foot in the door with the right people. Brian just filmed an episode of a project on, I believe it’s A&E, for John Gotti Jr. Brian went down to New York and shot some scenes for a project he’s working on with, I believe it’s A&E. And so that’s going to be coming out in January of 2027. It’s about his father and about guys that were in prison with his father and guys who was in prison with him. Ryan was in Rave Rock with John Gotti Jr. the whole time. Ryan was doing 13 years and John ended up doing seven or eight. And they became very close in jail. So we got these connections and through the grace of God, they like us. We did the right thing on them and it’s like a fairyland, fairy dream.
[6:49] And yeah, so thank God through the grace of God, everything’s going wonderful. And like I said, we got, I got some.
[6:56] Besides yourself. And of course, I’ll be loyal to you. You were one of my first reviews. I’ve got some huge podcasts coming up. I just did about a year and a half ago, two years ago, I did Kim Gagnon, Mark Gagnon out of Brooklyn. It’s got almost 1.7 million views. So people are starting, like I said, it’s just, I’m doing it as a different aspect. I never cooperated. I went and did my jail time, got out. My daughters were young at the time. They were 12, 13. They cost me a divorce because of going away. And I just said, the streets are not what they were. We all know that. And as time went on, exactly what I thought happened. The government got involved, started making it legal. Everything we went to jail for essentially is legal now. What a turnaround in the world. I know, it’s crazy. Just a little aside on that Gotti thing with A&E. They got hold of me. They were looking for a former prison guard that I had some contact information on that I did a show with on Gotti and couldn’t find him. But I had another guy that I did a show with that was with him down in Springfield and really got in the middle of a plot with Greg De Palma trying to kill somebody back in New York City.
[8:03] And they tried to, and this guy was setting up De Palma. And this guy realized De Palma was getting set up by another prisoner down there. And he was trying to pull Gotti into it. So he warned John Gotti about it. So that guy, he was excited as hell. They flew him somewhere. I think they flew him out to LA to interview him about the Gotti story. So it’s coming. It’s an interesting story. I told him, I said, when you see John Gotti Jr., tell him he needs to come on my podcast one of these days. He said, I will. I’ll call him later. I got his number. I’ll call him later.
[8:37] He’s got to come on my podcast one of these days. I will. I’ll call him. I’ve never been mean to his dad or any of his relatives or bad-mouthed anybody. I just report the stories, man.
[8:49] I know. Anyhow, so I want to talk about sports gambling. You were a bookie for Genovese. So, first of all, how did you— Allegedly. Allegedly. Okay. How did the guy get started doing that? I played a joking tour, but allegedly for the Genovese. Allegedly. It’s over now, man. It’s all legal. Yeah. So, how does a guy get started? Were you just really interested in football and were a personal gambler and like to bet on the games or are you good at numbers?
[9:16] No, yeah, I did that later on, but I did everything. But what happened was I was in the Navy and I got hurt in the Navy in the late 80s. And I was almost at the four-year mark and I got hurt. I cleaned up a chemical on my ship and I ended up getting a neurotoxic illness. And they found out it was the Navy’s fault. My executive officer should have had us wear certain suits and masks, devices, breathing devices, and he never did. He was negligent and he got court-martialed. And we, me and the two guys that were in this room that we cleaned up this massive chemical spill from a weapon got set. I happened to get an illness called myasthenia gravis. It’s a form of multiple sclerosis. It weakens the muscles. And the other two guys, one guy got Hopskin’s disease, the other one got leukemia. So it’s just one of these neurotoxic chemicals that it got in your system and it went haywire. And through the grace of God, I ended up out of the three illnesses with probably the best one because I’m still alive. And they passed away many years ago, cancer, both of them. So to the grace of God, he was there. He was with me then too, because I’m still around. I’m going to be 59 years old this October. Yeah. So anyways, the guy I was around particularly was a guy named Dolpho Big Al Bruno. And he allegedly was a captain and a boss of our area with the New York Genovese family.
[10:32] And yeah, he was away doing a couple of year bid and he got out and he was looking for a guy to run the office, essentially take bets, run the office, clean out the office. And clean out the office means you stay on top of all of his offices. They got you the stuff back in the late 80s. It was the fast 90s. And he was faster to me. And I’d stay on top. So then he couldn’t pass post. They couldn’t rob him.
[10:53] With that, he gave us bars. He gave us restaurants to run. So at night, I was running his big nightclub in Springfield, Mass College, TJ Orton.
[11:02] Big four-story nightclub. So he liked us. He liked us. And we had a beautiful restaurant with a venue. He gave us that. And we made some good money. But we were kids. We were out with the girls and this and that. And it didn’t help much because our restaurant venue and bar that we had was two blocks down from a gentleman’s club. In Chickabee, Massachusetts, called Anthony’s, the club was. So all the girls would be there. The night girls would be there laying out during the day, playing volleyball in their little patini. And it was funny because we were like, what? We didn’t care about business. We wanted to be around the girls. So that got us in some trouble. And yeah, so I started doing that in 1989, 90, right around there. I started doing it for them. And I lasted, other than a couple of state pinches, state police, state. I took probably two or three state clinches where essentially there’s no jail. You’re going to pay a fine. You keep your nose clean for a year, six months. It’s pretty much forgotten. But then I picked up my big FBI, my first FBI case in 2004. 2004, that’s when they got me. They got myself.
[12:08] The guy I was telling you about, Adolfo Bruno, was murdered in our social club in 2003. He was murdered. So he was in the indictment with us, me and another kid who’s, I don’t know if anybody watches the YouTube world. But I ended up, he was my childhood friend since five and six, seven years old, playing sports together. I slept at his house. His name is Anthony Irilla. Yeah. And he was my childhood friend. So he was around me my whole life, doing everything, bars, fights. He was always around. And so he got charged with the murder of Al Bruno.
[12:40] And he ended up cooperating and left that lice. And I don’t see him or talk to him anymore or whatever. He’s doing his own thing. God bless him. But I don’t really see him. But yeah, I went into federal prison. I went to, I started off at MCC Manhattan. And again, what I told you in the first interview with some serious guys, I didn’t know at the time who they were, but it ended up being, I was in a unit with the Vinny Gorgeous, Vinny Bassiano, great guy. Can’t speak enough of any of them. Alex mudai the albanian from the box that rudai guys that went up against the alleged gambino family they were serious guys all the albanians weren’t there all the like i said vinnie, and we played cards every night we bust chops i was only in there for about two months, and then they sent me to the usb caning it’s the united states penitentiary in waymar pennsylvania and i was only behind the wall a very short time not long and then they put me at the camp which camp is right next to the, because I had no violence. It was just sport book making. And then years earlier it was Lone Shark but nothing violent. I didn’t get caught with violence. So it was basically just a white collison.
[13:43] And yeah, so I went to, they ended up putting me at the USP Tain Camp, which is right on the same property. It’s maybe 20, 30 yards from the penitentiary. And if you screw up at the camp, you end up back in the penitentiary. It’s pretty good. It’s pretty easy living in the camp. You got a lot of nonviolent drug guys. You got a lot of, it was a bunch of guys from the Pizza Connection case. They were doing 30 years and they were finishing their last five years or less at the camp because they were good inmates. So I met some real heavy hitters and I got along great with all of them. It was like I was back home on the street and we were laughing, getting suntan. We were having a good time and playing soccer or whatever we were doing, laughing. And I was with all the New York guys and some Boston guys, but not many. And yeah, so I did my time. I ended up going to halfway house in Boston called Coolidge House. And essentially I was good for a couple of years. And then I came back on the street probably 2007, eight, about maybe 2010, 11. I came back on the street and I was doing the, the number, the, the shape of the number. Essentially it’s a daily number, but it’s run by pretty much us. And I was doing that and just hustling around, nothing crazy, nothing violent, but it was just about making money, made some good money. And then, yeah. And then I just kept my nose clean and then I got caught up in the biggest indictment in the East coast history and December 5th, 2019. And.
[15:08] I mean, being a gambler like that, what’s your day-to-day life like? You just go to a particular bar or something, just kind of hang out? No, no, it didn’t work like that. I was in the office. We had an office and I had an office and then we’d give the guys the number. Now in the beginning, it was them calling me directly. But as time went on towards the end, we were calling a number in Costa Rica, an 800 number, and you give them a code, and you would pay the people in costa rica so much for a guy it depends we had if we had 200 guys just said they would give you a cheaper rate they’d probably charge you nine to twelve dollars a guy but if you only had 50 guys or 100 guys it might be 14 or 15 dollars a guy and they handled everything they had the best lines you could have passed post them, and the guys would call them they would keep track of everything.
[15:54] Winners losers you could never get over on them. They’re very professional. And it was an office. And then once a week, I would call and they would give me all the figures of this guy, that guy. And we’d have to send them money because they got so much each guy that they took care of. And then we’d run around and we had a paint collection guy and we’d run around and paint collect. I’d give my slip to who I had to give it to. And yeah, we did that at the end. But in the beginning, it was me, another guy, a clean-out guy who would take my action and check it. I would take his action and check it so we stayed on top of each other, and also we had a guy who paid and collected he would pick up money go get to see the guys at the various locations get the money turn it in or go see them and get the money or or get the money up front and have to pay them whoever won, so it was a pretty good operation for a while and then as i should have known because towards the end 2002, one street right around there.
[16:48] Everywhere i went to feds were following me i’d go down a one-way street and be there i’d turn around go to a parking lot boom they’re there and i just knew i said this don’t look good they’re all over me they were trying to follow me to the spot, where i was but i used to forward the number back then we had call forwarding i’d sport it from one apartment to another to a house to a cellar to a back of a pizza shop so i was always we just caught forward to where we were going to be so that worked for a little while but, as the feds do they caught on to that and then they combated it. So it was getting bad at the end. And like I said, after that, February, after that 2003 or four pinch for the bookmaking, my co-defendant was Adolfo Bruno, but he was an indicted co-defendant because he was killed. And Anthony Arlotta was my co-defendant. There was three of us and one other guy, but the other guy’s just a quiet guy. He was running around and I don’t even think he went to jail. The only ones that went to jail were me and Anthony.
[17:39] The Chiefs are playing the Green Bay Packers or whatever. Somebody set the line. Now, did you get the line from Costa Rica or was that? At the end we did, but in the beginning we would get it from Vegas. We had real talented bookmakers in New York city. I used to call a guy in New York in the Bronx. He would give me the number. It was up to us to adjust the line. In other words, if New England Patriots are playing New York Giants, In New York, the Giants are going to be a different line than they would be in New England because everybody in New England is taking New England Patriots. Everybody in New York is taking the Giants. So you’ve got to adjust the line a little bit. And then, of course, we keep track of how much money was on a game. So if there was $50,000 on a game, we would say, okay, the line changed. So now minus two and a half of $50,000 they had, we’d go up to three. You know what I’m trying to say? So anybody that came in after that, we’d say, hey, the line moved. It’s not two and a half or more. Now it’s three or three and a half. So we did that to try to combat that but, sometimes it would work sometimes it wouldn’t and then some guys there were professional games that were trying to middle us so they wanted to get in the middle wing both sides so there was a lot of that craziness there was some there was some, guys that weren’t that sharp gambling they lost every week and then there was real professionals that studied and wanted to catch that extra and they had guys that would buy a half a point if the line was free we’d say okay we’ll give you they give you more money.
[19:00] If they lost and they buy that half a point. So from two and a half, they’d buy up to three. And a lot of times they either break even, they push or they win just by a half a point. So they knew what they were doing. It was very stressful.
[19:13] Every night, seven nights, seven days and nights a week, football, basketball, hockey, everything, horse racing. It was crazy. I had kids at the time, little kids, and you can never be home. You try to be home, but you’re always running out. Saturday and Sunday, forget about it. New Year’s Day, forget about it. You’re there from 10 in the morning until 10 at night. It was, it was very, very stressful and hectic. Very stressful. Yeah. I can only imagine what that, that stress was like on you. Plus moving that line around like that, you had to keep so much in your head. So many phone calls. Then they’re checking on me. The guys in the street are calling me. What, what, where was the light on this game? They’re asking me cause that’s their money. If they lose their money, they want to know what’s going on. So it was just stressful, 24-7, 3 in the morning phone calls. I got to see you. When you got it, it’s 3 in the morning. I got to see you. When they call you, you got to go. You can’t just say, I’ll see you tomorrow. No, you get up and throw on a sweatshirt, and you go meet them wherever you want to meet. At a restaurant, wherever they want to go to their house. It was just so stressful. I’m so at peace now, Gary. It’s beautiful. I’m so at peace. It’s beautiful. I’m going when I want.
[20:19] Forgive my stupidity here, but so you say you moved the line. So I’d make a bet. I’d take the Chiefs in three. but yet there’s so much money goes down on the chiefs and then the line moves. Do I always have your line? Now you’re lying, Gary, whatever you bet it for, your line stays the same. All right. Anybody that new comes in, they’ll say, Oh, my friend, John, just making up a name. My friend John got the line for three and I’ll say, I’m sorry. That was 20 minutes ago. It’s three and a half now. Okay. You know what I mean? And that’s based on the amount of action on it. So now trying to balance the books, who, somebody up above you, i would say or do you you have a book that you try to keep balanced or is it that going up i balanced everything i balanced them i balanced the books.
[21:03] And i did all the figures and i had to clean out guy check my work because you want to make sure you’re right you don’t want to until when costa rica came around that was a whole nother bargain because they did all the correcting i didn’t have to do nothing but make a call, stay on top of it and once a week make a call and clean out all the figures so it was very easy once that when we started utilizing that so what if the books got way. That’s what happened in Kansas City once with the Chiefs went to that first Super Bowl or no, the second one with Minnesota. The books got out of line and Nick Savella called down to the social club and the guy told him, we’re 40,000 over. And he said, what? What’s going on? And then they made some calls and they balanced the books. What happens when the books get out of balance? What did you do? Did you have somebody, another guy? We had a couple guys in Vegas and a couple guys in New York. We had 100,000 on a game.
[21:52] A certain person that knew them would call them and say, can you take 25,000 of this? We don’t want the whole 100,000. We only want to do 75,000 on one game or 50,000, whatever. But then at the end, my guy, at the time, Al Bruno, Adolfo Bruno, they called him Big Al. He said, we take everything. We’re not giving nothing to nobody no more. If I got a hundred thousand on the game, we’re keeping it. So at the end, we didn’t even give it to anybody. He kept the whole thing. And if he lost big and if he won big, he didn’t care. Yeah, I see. So for you guys who don’t understand, they get paid off the big. The loser pays an extra 10%. And so that’s how the bookie makes money. And that’s why you want to balance the books because you’re not really gambling. But Al Bruno didn’t mind gambling. It sounds Nick Savella did not like to gamble. He was a big gambler himself. Yeah, he was a big gambler himself.
[22:40] Wow. That’s got to be a crazy life. It’s just, I can’t even imagine.
[22:44] He made millions. He was a multi-millionaire. He made millions. Yeah, I can imagine. So let’s talk about the money.
[22:50] The money. To me, I was told that the advantage of the old-time bookie, the guy that you just deal with as opposed to the apps, betting on the apps, you got to have the money in there, a credit card hooked up to it. You got to have the money. With you, you didn’t have to have the money. I could just call you up and say, Hey, put a dime down on credit for essentially the first seven days you bet on credit. Okay. And so you just, you had guys that you would extend huge amounts of credit just on their word. And then you, because you felt they were always going to, if they lost, they were going to pay up. Or did you make sure you got the money before? We weren’t stupid either. If a guy worked a construction job, we didn’t let him bet 3000 a game. We better let him bet seven, 800 a game. So we knew if a guy owned a big conglomerate business or he owned a huge restaurant that made millions it sky’s the limit bet whatever you want because they knew if anything happened he would pay or they’d get the restaurant, we knew if a guy worked at a regular job making back then making four or five hundred a week we’re not going to let him bet five hundred six hundred a game two games he stuck eleven hundred he only makes three hundred a week explain that let him to explain that to his wife. It’s just headaches. So each guy would be a different level. Okay, that’s another thing you had to stay on. This guy not overboarded because they tried to overboard you. A guy had to.
[24:09] A $2,000 limit for the gang, he’s going to try to, that’s 6,000. So you got to be on top of that too, because you got to stay on top of who’s betting what. That’s another thing. And with a hundred guys, it’s crazy. It is crazy. How’d you keep all that in your hand, man? You got, I’ll tell you what, you’d be the king of the world to keep all that in your hand. How did you do that? Now that’s the way they did it back then. I did it. A lot of it was written down. It was all written by hand. That I would tax it to somebody to stay on top of me. They would tax me the stuff to stay on top of them. Everybody’s checking each other, so you ain’t lying.
[24:45] Wow. And of course, for the law enforcement, the thing about the sports book is it really lends itself to evidence, the evidence being out there, get on a wiretap and catch you doing that. I went through a guy’s trash one time and got a whole bunch of slips in there that I confronted him. I just wanted to make him into an informant. So I confronted him and he looks at me, he gives me this shocked look that I knew about how much he had made or lost that week before. I happened to run into him in a grocery store about a month later. He said, hey, he says, I know how you figured that out. You got my trice that day, didn’t you? So he never would snitch to me either. Yeah, at the end of the week, yeah, they came to me too. I said, I’m all set. They said, you’re in big trouble. It’s all your friend. I said, we don’t do nothing. So whatever you want to do, they came to you about two weeks before they picked us up.
[25:34] That’s a crazy world, but there’s so much money in it. I was just listening to a story, a podcast, a sports bookie that was dealing with Otani, the Japanese baseball player, with his handler, his translator, and was taking all that action. He got in trouble. If you’ve read that, he ended up doing about a year. I’ll give you a thousand dollars they were paying. Yeah. And so are there, and he was like a pecker would and not a tie. And he wasn’t really connected to the mob, but didn’t seem like, are there guys that are like huge like that, that are operating a whole different level outside of your level, what you guys did?
[26:13] Not to that level back then. Now, forget it. It’s open season. Nobody’s afraid. As that world, the organized crime world, if you want to call it that, they’re not killing nobody no more. The biggest threat organized crime had was violence. And now, with all the RICO and all these different laws, nobody’s doing violence no more. And if they are doing violence, they’re pretty much days are numbered. They’re definitely going to jail. I mean, it’s just the way it is. And if they do something crazy and they’re facing 30 years, let’s face it, it don’t bother me either way. I don’t care because I don’t do that. I’m not in this bill that lights no more. But everybody’s becoming cooperators now. And they go on YouTube and have big shows. And they’re like half-ass movie stars. People who are facing 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, they’re not afraid to cooperate. Because look what’s going on on the social media. The Sammy the Bulls and everybody else. I’m not going to mention names. But they just come out and they say, we changed our life. We changed our life. And they start podcasting. Then they start whatever. They start doing and making money. And that’s it.
[27:13] Now, you mentioned violence and you mentioned loan sharking earlier. Now, when you’re a bookie like this and guys, you know a lot about their personal finances, their businesses, that they have a business and they’re susceptible to maybe needing a loan just to even get by. Maybe they got a small business and there’s guys out there that are connected to you that might put five grand or 10 grand in a small business. And did that work hand in glove with the- Half the time-
[27:39] It was the guy that they owed that did the lending on the money on his own money and pretended I can send you to another guy. But it was a fake thing. But, you know, but yeah, of course, it ran hand in hand. So if they couldn’t pay, they say, OK, you go to this guy now and you pay him, say, one of your thirty dollars on every thousand. The guy owes five thousand. You got to pay thirty dollars a week each thousand. So you’re talking one hundred fifty dollars a week juice. Yeah, you’re talking six hundred dollars a month in juice without even nothing coming off the top, not a nickel. So that runs hand in hand That’s easy But now people are starting to stop that, Yeah when a guy owes you money They talk about oh the mob will kill you They aren’t going to kill you.
[28:21] Because if you kill them Then you never get any money out of them Gary they’re not killing anyone these days And that’s what the allure It’s done In other words what do you think there’s so many cooperators for, Because there’s cooperators That cooperating come right back to their old neighborhood, Nothing happens it’s over it’s over now especially with like you brought up before the legal fan duel and all these things, the new organized prime and everybody knows it i hope they know this is the federal government they’re the new organized prime sports gambling they run it marijuana business they run it, banks these high more high interest loans yeah subprime don’t pay your car payment or don’t pay your house payment for two or three months they’re gonna take your house they’re gonna take your car yeah they ain’t gonna use violence but you ain’t gonna have a house or car, you know what i’m saying and here’s the thing that’s the biggest thing, with fan duel like you mentioned before all these different services you got to have the money up front a credit card or cash whatever if you go to the casino, that guys who want to bet on the street right now.
[29:25] They’re trouble because you know they ain’t got the money to put up at a real casino or they ain’t got a credit card to go through fan duel because it’s easier to do right from your house with no aggravation so they go to a street guy and there’s still a few street guys out there not around here but i’m sure there are, it’s stupid because the guys would be legit legitimately gambling in these gambling places fan duel and this one and that one, they’re going through you because they’re broke and they’re taking a shot now if he gets stuck good luck in your money unless Unless it’s a smaller amount, you’ll get it. If it’s a big amount, you ain’t got a shot, not a shot. Another question I’ve got about that, I remember one of the Sopranos, and I remember an operation here that seemed to be busted out by the mob. There was a guy that got in debt really big time in a card game on the Sopranos, and then they moved into his business and started bringing it. Yeah, the sports guy, the guy with the sports business. Started taking stuff out the back door, making him order more stuff and taking everything out the back door. Yeah, I’ve never seen that, but I’m sure that happens. Okay, you didn’t really see that. I just wondered how prevalent that was. I did see it one time. Yeah, I saw it one time here in Kansas City, but you could never prove it, and the guy wouldn’t talk. So it’s one of those things. Interesting. The apps have really taken it completely away, it sounds to me like. I thought there might be a little something going on, but what you said really makes sense. If a guy can’t use the app, he doesn’t have any money.
[30:50] I think you’ve answered all my questions about Sportsbook, and I don’t really care that much about the mob in Sportsbook, but I know as we talked, that was a mother’s milk for a mafia family. It was just a steady source of income, plus a whole lot of connections you can make out in the community because everybody seems to like to gamble. And so you would find other people that you would end up in business deals with or doing things with because they were gamblers. It was like part of the whole network of the associates or people who were connected to the mob. If a mob guy needs a favor, he might come to you and say, you know anybody that’s a really good plumber? Yeah, I got a guy.
[31:27] You’re the guy. A lot of the bigger players in that life, it’s above my pay grade, obviously, but a lot of the big players, they don’t even care about the sports or loan sharking up. And they’re millionaires already. They got construction, and especially in New York, construction and unions. And they make, they got restaurants that are, multi-million dollar restaurant revenue of millions of dollars. And the thing I forgot that I was going to tell you before, I just thought of it is when the government, when you lose your money to a casino or to FanDuel, they’re like, we provided a service. Sorry, that’s how it works. But when we wanted our money back in the day, you’re a gangster, you’re a criminal, you’re trying to take people’s houses, you’re making people get divorces because you’re taking their money. But when the government does it, oh, we’re sorry, it was a service. You played and you lost. Sorry. They don’t care if you lose your house. They don’t care if you’ve got to get kicked out with your kids out of an apartment. You’re a degenerate. You’re a gambling addiction person. They don’t care. But when we did it, you lowlights, how could you do this? Oh, my God. The guy got to lose his house because of you. It’s crazy. It’s absolutely insane.
[32:30] And, uh, lots of times I think like a mob bookie like that, if you just say, you’re just not betting with me anymore and I’m putting the word out there, ain’t nobody going to take your action anymore and just, just pass on. In theory, in theory, that’s good, but it never works because they’ll go under, they’ll have their cousin call under their, under his name and they’re still betting, but they just go under a different name, a fake name, another, they get a cousin that, that is a good guy. I bet for them, but it’s really them. That came out a million times. I bet through his friend’s name, and it’s really him. And that always comes out. So in theory, that’s a good thing you said, but it doesn’t work that way. I tell you, those degenerate gamblers, and I hate that. I don’t want to denigrate anybody, but I don’t know if it better work for it. Degenerate gamblers is like a degenerate alcoholic or drug addict. You come down to it. It’s worse. You won’t tell any lie to be able to do your addiction. You want me to tell you why it’s worse than a drug addict or an alcoholic?
[33:29] An alcoholic can only get a drink so much once in a day, in a day, and he’ll pass out. A drug addict will only do so much drugs in a day before he passes out or nods out or overdoses. A gambler doesn’t have that problem. They can keep gambling and gambling and gambling. It doesn’t stop until they have nothing and they robbed everybody and they barred from everybody in their family and all their close friends. They can just keep going, at least an alcoholic. I’m not saying it’s better. But when he drinks, he’s only drinking so much that day, and then he’s passed it down. Yeah. He’s got a degenerate gambling can go 24-7. Boom. Constantly. So I think it’s worse. Yeah. You don’t get arrested for driving under the influence of gambling either.
[34:11] You can still drive around. Yeah, there’s flip sides to everything. There’s flip sides to everything.
[34:16] But like, I told you, we picked up that big indictment in the East Coast, the FBI. For my nephew, the last king and diamond, biggest diamond on the East Coast. And they, they’re in my house and they actually found a gun, on my nightstand, but it was a Smith & Wesson. I don’t know if anyone knows, but Smith & Wesson’s main factories in Springfield, Massachusetts, where I live. Oh, yeah, it is. I didn’t know this at the time. I’m saying, all right, I got to go away four or five years for a gun charge. I had ammunition in the gun, too, and I had a box of ammunition under my bed. Hey, listen, it is what it is. I was a convicted felon. I know it, but you got to have something in the house just in case God forbid somebody breaks in and whatever. You want some kind of security. And shame on me, I had it, but it is what it is. So when they came in, the FBI found the gun. Now, it’s federal law. I didn’t know it since the time. My lawyer goes, I think we’re going to be all right. What are you talking about? He said, they only could charge you for the ammunition. I said, how do you figure they saw on the gun? He goes, it’s a Smith & Wesson gun. He goes, first of all, is the gun okay? Is there anything that I should know that was used on this gun? I said, no, absolutely not. It’s brand new. It was tooken from the factory. Somebody who worked there took it. And he said, unless they can prove that gun left state lines.
[35:26] They only could charge through the ammunition and they could never prove it unless state lines because there was a Smith and Wesson. They found me in Springfield within in my apartment and the factories in Springfield. So now if that gun was a manufacturer out of New Germany or New Jersey or anywhere else, I would have got charged with the gun. You understand? It would have been like interstate, but they couldn’t prove it. When I went to court, the judge says, no, it’s a Smith and Wesson. It came Smith and Wesson was literally eight miles away from my house. So they couldn’t prove that. So they charged through the ammunition, which is about 16 months in prison. And I ended up, when I got sentenced, remember COVID had just hit, it was 2020.
[36:05] So COVID was in the real bad phase then. And I ended up, I was in Wyatt Federal Detention Center in Rhode Island, close to Providence, Rhode Island. That’s where they hold the federal inmates in my area. And I was there three or four months and then I had maybe another month when they held me until I got bail and everything. So essentially, I went to, I have the illness from the military. So my lawyer argued, hey, there’s COVID rapid in the things and he could get sick. So if he goes another year, he could get sick and die from his illness from the Navy. It’s an underlying condition. And they said, so the judge, a woman judge, her name was S-A-R-I-S, Judge Sarah’s, federal judge out of Boston. And she said she understood. And he explained an incredible, I got an incredible lawyer, attorney Dan Hagen and Dan Kelly from Springfield, Massa, incredible. My lawyer’s office attends, I don’t know if you’ve ever heard the name, Freddie G. He pleaded guilty to killing Whitey Bulger. Freddie was a friend of mine in his brother Ty. And Freddie’s in ADS Colorado right now and Ty’s in McQuarrie, something like that. McQuarrie? I don’t know that. Federal penitentiary. But Freddie was the guy that was in West Virginia when allegedly Whitey Bulger got killed. And he pled guilty to it. So that’s the only reason I’m bringing it up. He already pled guilty. What did they do? They tapped another life sentence on who was already life sentence.
[37:22] Yeah. But they got him in ADX and locked down. And I know his kids, he talks to his daughter, but yeah, he was a good kid. Ty and Freddie were good kids. And it’s just a shame what happened to them. They cooperated, opened up on him and got them all life. And then all they were doing was following what allegedly what he told them to do. But whatever, that’s neither here or there. It’s not my business, but moving forward. So I ended up getting a year house arrest on the time I already had in. I did the year probation, three years. I just finished up a year and a half ago, two years ago. And like I said, I lost the weight. I was in the movie. I actually, I told you the story before. I actually shot the movie when I was under a federal indictment. I wasn’t supposed to leave Massachusetts. Now it’s over, so I can say it. I went to Connecticut to shoot the movie. If they were to call me, they would have put me back in jail. They would have revoked my bear.
[38:06] So I shot the movie under a federal indictment. And so moving forward, like I said, I’m at peace. I’ve never been a real, I’ve always been a Roman Catholic for my whole life. Altar boy, all that stuff. Never a centric, centrically religious. But lately, after what I went through, almost died. I just i gotta be honest with you my heart changed my heart’s changed and i value things i never valued before i value sitting in the park and smelling the trees and seeing the birds i never even thought of that before and it’s unfortunately it’s a blessing and a curse, but uh unfortunately it took me almost to die to wake up and uh got thin i got great opportunities coming down the pipeline i stopped hanging around, with all the negative people in my life no matter if i knew him from the street or I knew him from just being around anybody negative I just I.
[38:54] Went out as a gentleman hey listen I love you we had a great time but I just can’t be around I just gotta I gotta concentrate on myself and my sobriety I was never a huge drinker but at the end I was drinking wine every night going to dinner with the guys, I stopped drinking I haven’t had a sip of anything in seven months I feel like a new person I feel like like I said another 80 pounds I’ll be what I was when I was 18 years old. That’s incredible for me. Incredible. And you’re on the way. You are definitely on the way. And since all this transpired, like I say, I always say in all my social media, anybody sees social media, I’m on Facebook, Chiki Chikateli. I’m sure you’ll put it in the description. And Facebook, I’m at official, sorry, Instagram, at official Chiki Chikateli, TikTok, same name. And you’ll see what I preach. I preach a lot of things about helping people, A lot of God’s stuff. I really believe it. He did something for me that never was, never I experienced in my life anywhere. So I can’t take that with him doing a soft. There’s a reason for it.
[39:53] He wants me to do a different direction. And that’s what I’m doing. I’m not going to let my family down no more. And I’m definitely not going to let him down. Ever since I’ve made a turn seven to eight months ago, I know it’s only been a short amount of time. My whole life is completely different. Completely different from A to Z. My health, I exercise every day. I got a beautiful built-in pool. I’m tanning every day. I go swimming, so I get a tan. I work out in the gym in the morning. I eat healthy, extremely clean fish, chicken, no carbs. And no alcohol is a huge thing. I feel great. I’m up every, I sleep like a baby. I sleep now. I always had trouble sleeping, but now I go to bed 11 o’clock. I sleep till six in the morning. I sleep like a little kid again. I got a great relationship with my daughters, great relationship with my grandkids, I hope. with the soccer.
[40:41] I got a dream life. I really do got a dream life. And thank God for that. But when more comes out as far as movies, there’s another movie coming down the pipeline. They already asked me to be in it. And you know, listen, I was never an actor. So anything they give me, I’m very grateful. But this one’s going to be a little more of a talking role than the last one. I only had a small little role in the last one, but it was my first time. They wanted to see what I could do. And like I said, the reason I’m blessed is because.
[41:06] I was talking to an actor on set, and he’s thinking, you know how lucky you and Brian are? There’s people in New York and LA that wait for games in line with their criteria, with their picture, and who they are to try to get a commercial. He said, you never stood in one line in your life, and you’re in a molten picture. It’s unheard of. It’s unheard of. So I laughed, and I finally got it. I’m like, holy mackerel. Yeah, he’s right.
[41:31] So change is possible. You just got to call the younger generation today. You don’t have to listen to me. But you don’t want to be on the streets no more it’s over it’s over just open a business, whatever you like doing do but it’s over and anybody like in the gang world these gang kids these kids in the gang, they’re all going to go to prison it’s a sad shame and not only that but if you’re with anybody doing anything unless you do it yourself if you want to do something do it yourself because it could be your best friend in the world could be your own father if he’s facing more time than you, you know that saying they say that saying why go to the pen when you can send a friend and that’s the new way it’s disgusting so i chose to walk away, yeah i’m just blessed i wasn’t facing 20 or 30 years or 10 years like i was smart enough to not go that route what i did i knew if i got to go do four or five years i’ll go do it, but i never did anything to put me in risk of doing 10 years 50 20 30 years because i know me and i would have went and did it and i would my whole life would have been over my kids wouldn’t have known me my grandkids would never have met me. And I just made a conscious decision. Hey, listen, I bow out with grace. I still hang around my neighborhood. A lot of the old timers still love me. I go to dinner with guys that are still allegedly active, but I don’t do nothing. I tell them straight out. I’m just coming out to dinner with you laughing and I’m going home. I don’t want that. And they have respected. They go, Tiki, we respect that. Yeah. So I’m just heading on a great course.
[42:56] You go back in that life, you get locked up or covered up, as they say. I’m done. Whatever you want. I’m done. I’m done. I was a prideful kid when I was young, and I thought that was cool. And I had pictures in my bedroom with John Gotti. That was my thing. A lot of people had pictures in their rooms of Bobby Orr or Red Sox or Kansas City Chiefs or whatever. I had posters in my room when I was a 10, 11, 12-year-old kid of John Gotti. Every mafia main guy in the country got sick. 12 years old, I’m hanging up pictures of John Gotti in my room. And I respect John Gotti because he’s saying what you want. oh people he’s flashy there see that listen to me he lived that life.
[43:35] Like no other he gangsters tell you he’s a gangster gangster and at the end of the day when he got pinched what did he do he went to prison and suffered and died, in a prison of cancer and he walked it right to the gate he walked it right to the gate that’s in that life if you want to be in that life he always said his son, in this life i’m either going to get killed or i’m going to jail for life that’s I already know that’s what it’s going to be, and absolutely, it happened. All right. Chicky Chickatelli, I really appreciate you coming on the show. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Stay in touch. As you’re doing more things, let me know what you’re doing. We’ll put something else together. Get your name out there and keep your name out there, too. You’re such an interesting guy to talk to. Talk to. You’ve lived a life. A little bit of a redemption story, a little bit. We like redemption stories. We like redemption stories. And I like tell it finally in my life. I like telling the redemption story. So thank you very much for having me. I appreciate it. And whoever’s going to watch this, I appreciate it. Thank you for watching. And it was a pleasure being with you, Gary. And like I said, I appreciate you. You were one of the first ones to do an interview with me before I did all the interviews. And I’ll never forget that. Thank you. All right. Great. Guys, I got one more thing to say before I get off of here. I have a new podcast coming out. It’s called.
[44:53] Murder Blueprint. It’s going to be about crimes other than the mob. It’s going to be about serial killers and kidnappers and serial rapists and those kinds of crimes. And I haven’t quite got it ready to go, but I’m going to be sending out some emails to everybody that subscribes to my channel via my website. And I’ll mention more about it and I’ll have a trailer out there pretty soon. So if you see that.
[45:17] Blueprint Murder, if you don’t really like that kind of stuff, just do me a favor, get on there, click on it, and say, I like this, and give me a little review. You don’t have to lie. Just say, I listened to one of these. I know Gary. He’s a good guy. I listened to his podcast and helped me get that thing amped up right away. I’m going to have my granddaughter come on with me, and I told her, if you’ll help me with this, we’ll get it going, then I’m going to back off because I don’t want to do all this work. And so we’ll see how it goes. So thanks a lot for coming on, Chicky. Absolutely. My pleasure. Thank you. All right.