Former Brooklyn mob associate Jimmy Easy (James Sirocco) joins retired Kansas City Police Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins for a candid discussion about his life in organized crime, his decision to cooperate with the government, and his years in the Witness Protection Program. Jimmy describes his connections to the Gambino, Colombo, and DeCavalcante families, including his rise through bookmaking, loan sharking, Joker Poker machines, insurance fraud, and other rackets while operating around Brooklyn, Howard Beach, and Ozone Park.
The conversation explores Jimmy’s connections to the Gambino, Colombo, and DeCavalcante crime families, including disputes involving John Gotti Jr., Rudy Farone, and other New York underworld figures. He recounts surviving an attempted murder, receiving permission to retaliate, and the violent realities of Mafia politics.
Jimmy explains why loan sharking was his most profitable business, how organized crime controlled lucrative fireworks sales, and details insurance fraud schemes, chop shops, and staged medical clinics, along with stories of robberies, extortion, and life as a major earner in the Mafia.
The interview then turns to Jimmy’s arrest, his decision to cooperate with federal authorities, and what it was actually like entering the U.S. Witness Protection Program. He describes rebuilding his life in Arkansas, starting legitimate businesses, raising his daughters, and why he finally decided to tell his story after more than two decades.
Gary and Jimmy also discuss Mafia sit-downs, family politics, the murder of DeCavalcante boss John D’Amato, life after organized crime, and Jimmy’s memoir, “Hit Man: Tell All About the Mafia and the Witness Protection Program.” The result is a rare insider conversation about both the criminal world and the difficult transition to a lawful life.
Try my other Podcast on Apple Podcast Murder Blueprint
Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”
Subscribe to the website for weekly notifications about updates and other Mob information.
Go to the store or make a donation click here
To rent ‘Brothers against Brothers’ or ‘Gangland Wire,’ the documentaries click here.Â
To Rent Ballot theft: Burglary Murder Coverup click here
To purchase one of my books, click here.
Transcript
Gary Jenkins: [00:00:00] hey, all you wiretappers out there, it’s good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins. You, most of you know I’m a retired Kansas City, Missouri Police Intelligence Unit detective, worked the mob here in Kansas City for about 15 years. More like 14 probably, but I worked them for quite a while.
And I have a guest tonight that’s a really interesting guy. Got a new book out. We’re gonna talk to him about it. And he was connected to the the five families back east, as you’ll be able to tell by his accent. You’ll ha- You’ll get that nice New York b- Eastern accent with my hillbilly twang and you’ll have a nice little contrast here, guys.
And one thing before I get started, I want to remind you, I’ve started that sister podcast called Murder Blueprint, and I really want y’all to go on your Apple app if you can, ’cause it’s not going on YouTube. I’m – doing audio only. Go on your Apple app and like it and subscribe and give it a review, if you would, and help me get some more listeners on that, that other podcast.
It’s gonna be about serial killers [00:01:00] primarily, I guess I don’t have enough to do. I’m gonna do two podcasts now. Anyhow, so we have here today Jimmy Easy. Welcome, Jimmy.
Jimmy Easy: Welcome. Thank you for the show and inviting me, Gary.
Gary Jenkins: I’m really glad to have you on. I first thing I wanna do and there’s been some talk back and forth on Facebook or some of the social media stuff, I don’t remember where I saw it, about who you really are and who you are connected to, because you’re not exactly a household name.
So talk about your past and your real name a- and your witness protection name- Well- … and how, tell
Jimmy Easy: us how
Gary Jenkins: that
Jimmy Easy: went … I’m in the witness protection program now, but I signed out, so- Okay … so that’s why I’m able to do this. . My my last name’s Sirocco and my nickname is Jimmy Easy.
I was out of downtown Brooklyn. I was born and raised in Ozone Park. Brooklyn, Ozone Park, and then Howard Beach, and then eventually I got around Rudy Farone I capped it into the Cavicante crime family, and I moved downtown. And next [00:02:00] thing I’m bookmaking, loan sharking, Joker Poker machines.
I did other couple stupid things that’ll haunt me the rest of my life, and which I’m not proud of, and my, my first thing was bookmaking, the football cards. You remember the football sheets? Yeah. That was my first thing.
Yeah. Gary got jammed up. He owes me 3,000. He don’t have it. Okay, 2% a week, 3% a week, whatever I charge you- … until you pay me my money. Then I said, “Wow, this is nice. I don’t have to answer phones, no nothing, and I’m collecting money every week.” So I started leaning more towards loan sharking, and I was got…
I went with Rudy Farone, and just so happened he was one of the largest loan sharkers in Brooklyn. One of them. And he was associated with a Colombo wise guy, Joe Smash. They grew up together. They were partners in the business. So I really found a good home because I got people telling me, “Put my money out.”
And my name was reputable. I had a lot of money out there. I had too much money, then I was leaking somewhere into Howard Beach. And that, that ruffled the [00:03:00] father first. “Who’s this kid? Who’s this kid? Who’s this kid?” Because I don’t really know. I was in the street. I lived in Howard Beach way, but that’s…
“Who’s this kid? ” They kept hearing my name. Like the limousine company, the guy owed me. We finally took his company. Amaco gas station, jammed up two, 300,000. And he kept hearing my name. So finally they reached out. They said, “He’s around Rudy.” So they reached out to Rudy, said, “Tell this kid stop doing business in our neighborhood,” and this and that.
So Rudy said, “Lay low for a while. Lay low for a while.” And then Junior and Bobby Boriello, I don’t know if you heard of them, Gambino. Yeah. Bobby was a captain and he got killed. They had a sit down over it and Rudy said, “Listen, it’s my money. Now he’s just working for me.”
He sent Bobby Boriello to the Blue Fountain Diner on Cross Bay Boulevard, and they w- he was there with another guy. I don’t even know who it was. And they sat and they talked, and Rudy said, “Listen, he’s putting money on the streets for me.
What is your [00:04:00] problem?” At that point, they- realized, you know what? They can’t put the clamps on me no more. They can’t say, “You gotta pay me now.” , Rudy got awarded his money. So they paid the money for the guy at the Amaco gas station. So they, they took him then. I had multiple beefs.
Then after John went away, the son, I had a bad beef with him over the firework business, and that’s what really Gary brought it to a major head because he started telling me I can’t sell fireworks either in the neighborhood. I’ve been selling fireworks and I lived in the neighborhood since I was a kid.
I went to school in Island Beach. Eh you can’t sell fireworks. I’ve been doing it all my life. So it was like, you know what? Daddy went away. I’m new acting honcho. I’m feeling my oats. I’m taking my steroids. I, he flexed his muscle and I said, “Do what you gotta do. I’m selling for Rudy.” I’m told to say that He didn’t like it, so I get a call from Rudy.
“You got a problem,” he said. “You can’t answer people like that.” I said, [00:05:00] “Rudy, what am I gonna do? He’s telling me I gotta either pay to come into Howard Beach. Then, I got you in my corner, why should I have to pay?” Make a long story short, it got ugly, and they caught up with me. They tried to kill me and I lived.
I survived it. And at the end of the beef, they sat down, and I, it was up to me. I would kill John Gotti Jr., no doubt about it. Then I asked to kill some of the guys who were at the scene that night. It was a, a handful of guys. “No, but you could kill the kid Abie. That’d set you up.” S- so Junior gave me permission to kill Abie.
So we tried to clip him one night, and the gun jammed. He got away.
In Howard Beach. And John Jr. sent a message, “The only thing you do is don’t kill him in Howard Beach. I don’t need no heat.” Where’d I try to kill him? In Howard Beach on 155th Avenue and Cohansey.
I sat on him for days, Gary, in his van, [00:06:00] in the backseat waiting for him to get in.
He’s going to the Fulton, one of those fish markets in the morning. Not fish mark- vegetable market in Canarsie. Got the vegetables. He supplied all of his grocery stores, restaurants. So I was waiting in the truck for him. As soon as he got in, I would’ve popped him. He really did lie. He deserved it. And then I got…
Then after when we blew the hit, we had our team there. I had two, two, three cars there. We had radios. As soon as the shots were fired out, about, ’cause Mikey Sapp jumped out of the driver’s seat. My driver fired the shots after mine jammed. He had the revolver. If I had the revolver- … we wouldn’t be discussing it.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Now it’s interesting you’re talking about the fireworks business. I just talked to a kid from Long Island who was talking about the fireworks business and with Gotti’s and was it Quack Ruggiero and Angelo- Angelo’s son. Yeah, Angelo’s son. And so he was in the fireworks business, and Gotti kinda got in the fireworks business with him over there.
I find that fascinating. We got the same thing in Kansas City. You [00:07:00] mob guys love the fireworks business. Now, what is the deal with the fireworks business? He talked about there’s a huge markup in it- Oh … and you sell in a short period of time, but did you have stands like, Stands … find a vacant lot and put a big stand up?
Jimmy Easy: Gary, I had warehouses. From the middle of April, I started bringing trucks in. stocking up warehouses. I had guys like, you know those Econoline vans?
Had… We filled those up, and I’ll tell you, 7,500, I’ll fill a van up, guaranteed it’ll bring you at least 15, 20 back.
Gary Jenkins: Ah, wow. Yeah,
Jimmy Easy: that’s incredible. So that van cost me a quarter.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: 2,500. Charge them 6, think about who you’re dealing with. So I wasn’t even selling to the public no more. I had everybody. I had half a dozen guys at least that I would be selling for me.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: And he had a guy that was running his called, excuse me, Michael D’Ambrosio or Joey D’Ambrosio, I forget. It’s been so many years.
I left the life in, remember, ’01. [00:08:00] And he calls me up, Junior’s around the corner at his house. He’s running all the fireworks for me. He says, “Hey, Jimmy, can you come around the corner? I wanna talk to you,” Junior said. And that’s when he said you can’t sell fireworks.
Gary Jenkins: Interesting. Now, in your book now, remind us the name of your book.
Jimmy Easy: Hit Man: Tell All About the Mafia and the Witness Protection Program.
Gary Jenkins: All right. So that’s, that sounds fascinating, especially as you go into witness protection. Now, you probably go into this fireworks thing and this, these deals with the Gottis a lot more detail, I would imagine, which is, you don’t need to go into that detail here, but we wanna make sure people know about that book and what it’s about.
So that that, that stuff is really sounds fascinating. , An integral part of the mob life is fireworks. I just, I still can’t get over it, but it’s just such a money maker. The markup
Jimmy Easy: is phenomenal, like a mat of firecrackers. I’ll pay maybe $1.20.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: They’re selling them for 10, I’m selling them for 4.
I’m happy 300% markup.
Gary Jenkins: Wow.
Jimmy Easy: [00:09:00] Without getting dirty from Peter to Paul.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Yeah, really.
Jimmy Easy: New York-
Gary Jenkins: S- it’s
Jimmy Easy: great
Gary Jenkins: market business in a way, but, But
Jimmy Easy: fireworks are outlawed here in New York.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: So that’s why you know how it is. You can’t have it, you want it more we were able to get the prices.
It’s not like down South. I don’t know where you are, I’m in Arkansas. It’s not like fireworks here, a lot cheaper.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: They sell them legally- Yeah … but no class C, no explosives. See, we had blockbusters. We had the six-inch, eight-inch, 12-inch mortars that boom, you know. Out here they don’t have that stuff.
Yeah. They got the kids stuff. And it’s kid- they won’t hurt people really, the stuff they got.
Gary Jenkins: Interesting. Yeah, we where I live in Missouri I live right next to a little town that fireworks are legal. There’ll be like 20 fireworks tents goes up, go up for about 10 days time, and a friend of mine’s connected to one of them.
He said they make $100,000 in about two weeks time out of one of those tents. It’s crazy. They charge- Oh, yeah … $500 a day for rent on the tents, [00:10:00] and they don’t mind paying it. It’s crazy.
Jimmy Easy: Yeah. So- See, up there we had to hide it in New York.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. But all the cities around this city, it is illegal, but everybody flogs into Riverside and buys their fireworks.
And two or three of them I know are mob guys it’s really-
, You were an earner it sounds like.
You were more of an earner, a guy that went out and made a lot of money, which was your in with these guys. So what, what racket do you think made the most money with the least amount of effort? Loan sharking. The
Jimmy Easy: loan sharking? Loan sharking with, without a doubt. You do a score here, you rob a drug dealer, you rob a diamond dealer, but that, I steadily had my money every week, a great paycheck.
And I, also my poker machine, I bought a Rudy, and he only had about a dozen stops. I had the stops packed. I had them all over the machines. And I’ll tell you what score, you’ll get a kick out of this ’cause you a cop. Some states it’s l- legal.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: So I had badge, DEA. I had, we had all that stuff.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I was going into stores with the [00:11:00] Asian people or the Indian people in there and telling them, “Whose machine is this?” And you know they get all scared. Yeah. “Oh, I don’t know speak English.” Yeah. Here’s my card. I give them a fake cop card. “Here. Tell him they can pick it up down at the police station, or you want to come with me now?”
No.” I tell them. Money and all we took it. I didn’t buy no more machines. I started taking everybody’s machine in Brooklyn and Queens. They’re probably cursing me right now.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So did you take any- But
Jimmy Easy: it’s all
Gary Jenkins: down … you weren’t taking any other mob guy’s machines, I hope. Yeah. They wouldn’t have taken it that…
You were, yeah. Oh, man, you’re bold. You are bold, man.
Jimmy Easy: We went right in the boardwalks and everything and took them.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Yeah, we’ve got them up here now. They act like they, they’re gray market machines. They say that they’re not game, they’re games of skill, not games of chance, and they’re riding a fine line and they’re all over the place now, besides the casinos and all the, the stores that are…
they really are games of chance, but they’re big money makers. They’re huge money makers. Y- tell me about did you ever rob any drug dealers? I’ve talked to a couple guys that robbed drug dealers. [00:12:00] Yeah, we- That seemed to me like- …
Jimmy Easy: we
Gary Jenkins: took a couple of them … it’s the most dangerous thing to do
Jimmy Easy: It is if you wanna go in the middle of the street with, like street drug dealers.
I tried to take the nice low-key ones working.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I had one kid, I’m telling you, he supplied half of St. John’s at the time. So there’s the college, and he lived on the 12th floor of an apartment building. I’ve told this story, and I’ll tell you, it’s funny. And we couldn’t find a way to get in the house.
So the old man Jack, he was an old Westie. I’ll lower you down. “Are you lowering me down? I’m afraid of heights.” So then we go back in the building, steel frames. You can’t get in them, they’re apartment buildings. So Jack says, “I got an idea. We go home.” You look just like him, too. And we went home. Jack says to me, “I’ll see you in the morning.
Dress in jeans. We’re gonna go as cops, undercover.” “Okay.” He gives me the vest, the chain, the gun on [00:13:00] my leg.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: Jack bangs on the door. He holds up a picture. “This girl was last seen coming out of your apartment. You wanna open the door and talk about it, or you want me to get a search warrant?” The house is full of drugs.
He’s like dealing every kind of drug there is. There’s everything in there. No, you don’t have to,” but da-da. “You know what? We’re just gonna get a search…” “Okay, I’ll let you in,” ’cause he knows he had nothing to do with the girl’s body. It was a fake picture. Yeah. He lets us in. Jack says, “I’m gonna cuff you ’cause we wanna question you.”
“Okay. I didn’t do nothing wrong with the girl, I swear.” I start walking around the house. He’s, “Wait a minute. Youse ain’t cops.” Something like that he said. “What’s he doing searching my room and all?” I come out. “I want you to shut the hell up. You’re not going to jail. You’re being robbed.” You know what he said?
Thank you. My parents were killing me.” Big Jewish kid. You’d think he was a smart kid. His parents were not gonna allow him to do drugs and- Yeah … sell drugs. And he was happy. He took people’s… Everything was. He had jewelry that he u- took in [00:14:00] for, in exchange for the drug.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: And then Jack had a connection out with Whitey Bulger, and he would bring it out there and unload everything because Jack believed if we robbed it in the neighborhood, get it out of the neighborhood.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: So Jack was Irish. He was Irish. They know each other how to the… The guy Irish Westie, Fannin, whatever his name was. So when we did something like a jewelry score or something, Jack would bring it up there.
Gary Jenkins: Crazy. How about another thing? You’re an earner. Did you get into any insurance fraud?
I got a buddy here that used to be an associate a- and he’s always talking about insurance frauds they, they did. Did you do any of that insurance fraud
Jimmy Easy: or- A ton. We had chop shops. Let me tell you another thing. When I came home last time, I got involved with a doctor and the other guy was the administrator of the medical center He said, “Jimmy, you got all these collision shops around you.
Why don’t you start steering the people that are in car accidents?” We got lawyers, [00:15:00] doctors, everything. They got it all set up. They got a MRI clinic. They wrote a report for you. Yeah. Physical therapist So Downtown Brooklyn where I’m from, there’s a hospital called the Methodist, and Rudy had it locked down with the, we had the bookmaking there, loan sharking.
All, even nurses, they need $100 because they get paid every two weeks, give back 120. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but I put a kid there all, all day long collecting the money. So we opened this medical center right down the street from Methodist. Now, remind you, they had Boulevard Medical on Cross Bay Boulevard, and then they had, they opened one in Roosevelt, and then we opened one in Downtown Brooklyn.
We had the place packed. We had every collision shop bringing us people in accident. “You’re in an accident, don’t worry about it. I’ll give you 1,500. Come to my friend’s medical center,” because we give the collision guy 3,000. So they’re dropping them right off. We have a line out the door. Physical therapy two, three times a week.
We’re billing them up the yin [00:16:00] yang. I’m looking to walk away with the life now. I want to get into this.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: But then Ralphie Guarino, a friend of mine, robs the World Trade Center, the bank. Gets caught. Get off the elevator, his co-defendant took his mask off too soon. Bang, got him. He flipped. He flipped.
They go to Ralphie Guarino, George Hanna. He’s an agent. He said, “Ralphie, you just did 12, 14,” whatever he did. “You don’t want to go back. You want to work with us.” And he did agree to. He, and now remind you, I got pinched on a case with Nicky Corazzo, Lenny DeMaria, 47 of us on a sweep. So I was at Fort Dix during the time.
I come home, I got the medical center going. I’m, I see Ralphie, of course, through the medical center on a payphone. Unusual, right?
There ain’t even that many left no more. Yeah. I go hey, Ralphie. How are you?” Now we hung out together, [00:17:00] drank together. He bet with me. “Kid, stay away from me,” he goes.
“You’ll understand why. I love you. Stay away.” He was wired.
I didn’t catch it right away, to be honest with you.
I thought because another story I’ll go into, I had a fight with a kid, and I wound up shooting him, Ronald Holmes, and that was his godson. So I figured, I don’t know if it was that’s the reason, but that wa- three days later when they sweep Vinnie and everybody up, Vinnie Palermo, all the Serranos.
They swept 40 or something of them up. Ralphie was wearing a wire.
Yeah. So then when they all got in there, they all flipped. You know that. Yeah. Vinnie Palermo, Anthony Cappell, Anthony Rotonda. Right down the line, they all flipped. Eight months later, I flipped. I c- I’ve been in population, people are looking at me like, “Oh, he’s one of those Jersey guys.
He’s probably bad, too.” I was an outcast all of a sudden. Just came home, doing the right thing. Been arrested a [00:18:00] doz- I got a dozen pictures. A lot of them are local yokels, but I got a lot of pictures. Never said a word.
Vinnie Palermo, they put the cuffs on him one time. So those 20 years I poured money into that family.
The first time they got the bracelets, the… It was like a domino effect.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I come home to indictments. Thank God they… So they bring me in on extortion charge. You know how that works.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: And they go Jimmy, you know-” “… you’re gonna answer for this.” You know the game.
I know the
Gary Jenkins: game. Okay. Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: So I looked at the bastard.
I says, “Okay, I, are you done? I appreciate everything you told me, and I’d like to go get booked, processed in, and I wish you guys the best.” And George had to say, “Jimmy, you’re making a mistake. I’m telling you, you ain’t gonna have nothing but life.” I says, “George, you don’t understand. It’s not in me.” I went upstairs.
My, my son’s mother brought my son with my sister. She had just passed away, rest in peace. My sister was my [00:19:00] life. And they asked me, “Why don’t you flip? The feds just left the house. They said they’re gonna try to seek the death penalty.” And I was dying, “For what? I didn’t kill nobody.” I was, “What are they gonna seek?
They’re liars. They’re no…” You know how it is.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: They’re liars. They’re no good. They’re all, they make stories up. So I kissed my son goodbye, and I looked at his mother, and I says, “Go on with your life. I’m gonna go to trial.” I wanted to expose them. You know why? For 20 years, motherfuckers, I made yous a lot of money.
First time they put the bracelets on you, you abandon me, all yous. But it’s no justifying it. I still am what I am, and I’ll say it, and I’m not proud of it, not by a long shot, and I’m not proud of the things I’ve done. See, and I’m not doing this for no money. I just wanna get my story straight because you got people out there that tell a s- half a story.
You know what I mean?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I, and I and I flipped in ’01. We’re in 2026. [00:20:00] I didn’t come out for no money. I don’t need no money. But I just had to set the record straight. And what made me bring it out, my daughter’s never knew I did a darn thing wrong. I went through a bad tri- a divorce. She was a bad mother, and after that I won full custody, two year, two year battle.
My little one was four at the time, which she’s, you know- She’s taking it hard, and the s- the other two girls. I raised them now. I raised them by myself. I have a couple car dealerships. I, I own a couple other businesses. I own rent, b- I’m comfortable. I did the right thing by walking away.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: Do I hate what I am? Yeah. But I did the right thing.
Gary Jenkins: Gotta do what you gotta do sometimes. So tell me about mob politics the kind of the interactions between families. You were this Rudy Farone, and … the Cavalcantes. Is that how that worked?
Jimmy Easy: . The the Cavalcante’s [00:21:00] backbone was John.
Gary Jenkins: I got you.
Jimmy Easy: Like they did the Fred Weiss murder for John. Then they wanted to kill D’Amato, they had to get it okay. Everything was through the Gambinos. They were our strong arm.
Gary Jenkins: Okay, I got you now.
So what about sit downs and things like that? Were you ever have a dispute where y- somebody ended up in a sit down? Yeah, is it, is the- A bunch of them … the rumor true? Is it like you have a captain come in and speak for you with another-
Jimmy Easy: Yeah, like for example, you’re associate, and , a wise guy comes forward.
You can’t collect the money. So now I put my guy forward. Okay, it’s for you? Okay. It’s just a monopoly they have where s- everybody in the street earning illegal has to be with us one way or another. If not, we’re gonna abuse them. So at that point, I joined Rudy fairest guy you ever met. His whole family’s still talking.
The fairest guy you ever met. Now, there’s wise guys [00:22:00] out there, they’ll take everything you got. What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? Kill them? Then you gotta kill the next one.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: Look, look, Jersey crew was not the strongest. I was young. I learned that. If I would’ve been like with the Bonanno crew, like Louis Ha wanted me or a couple other guys, if I would’ve been with those families, it would’ve been a lot better for me.
I look back now because when you’re 18, 19, you don’t know what crew’s strong. You have Rudy as a captain. Wow.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: We’re not thinking. That captain is equivalent to a wise guy in the Gambino family if you ask me. Yeah.
Gary Jenkins: I see. I see.
Jimmy Easy: If that sometimes.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: Because really what happened to me, I should have had able to do, retaliate the way I wanted to, but Rudy said, “I’m too old to go to war.”
He said, “Wait five, six years. The kid’s walking around. He’s have… He’s not liked by his own crew. Wait five, six years. You hit him, nobody knows where it came from.”
Gary Jenkins: [00:23:00] Crazy. Crazy life. Okay, tell us, give us a step-by-step, a blow-by-blow about going into witness protection. That’s a, a thing that nobody seems to know about. How does that work? And I’ve seen a lot of mistakes here in Kansas City with people that ended up here. They really did some stupid things, -, the US Marshals did.
What was your experience with that?, How does that work?
Jimmy Easy: Before I got out, Gary, I sat there in my cell every night and said, “When I get out, I’m gonna turn my illegal thoughts into legal thoughts,” and I really did. I came out, I worked my butt off, and the Marshals only gave me $25,000 to open a business.
That’s key money.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: But I made it work. I started with a Wing Shack in Graham. I bought one. It was a franchise. I wind up buying two. I wind up after a while buying out the franchise owner. That’s how good I worked. I worked my butt off seven days a week.
Gary Jenkins: And this was down in Arkansas.
Jimmy Easy: Arkansas.
Gary Jenkins: That’s right.
Jimmy Easy: Then I [00:24:00] bought the-
Gary Jenkins: You moved to
Jimmy Easy: Arkansas. Yeah. I was, last name was Scopetto, and then I bought down Scopetto’s Italian Ice. There was none down here.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: New York ice in North Arkansas. Should’ve get my picture. The news company came down to interview the girls, and me walking by the co- get all over.
They sent a crew down looking for me. They had to move me to Landon then.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, really?
Jimmy Easy: And then after the trials were over, now remember I, I flipped in December 2000, they didn’t sentence me until ’09 I think it was. But they let me out in ’05, March 3rd to g- on, in bail. You know how it is as a cop, why they put you on bail.
You’re still facing, understand what he’s saying, zero to life.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: You’re more credible. They’d have sentenced me with bodies and you went home in five years, hold on, of course you’re gonna say whatever they want. Defense can- Yeah … poke a hole in it. But as long as you’re still saying, “Oh, I don’t know yet,” I’m gonna…[00:25:00]
And that’s how it works. The truth, I don’t know. And then Judge Leo Glasser gave me time served, but I was out in the hands of the US Marshals for four years. Never got in trouble, Helping multiple businesses. I built a brand new home for me. I got a summer home up, up in Norfolk on the White River. Oh, yeah.
I- … yeah, I live comfortable. You, so you know the- Yeah … the White, you know the White River.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, I’ve been on the White River. I’ve canoed on it a couple of times. It’s pretty- My- It’s a pretty cool
Jimmy Easy: place … my daughters love it. Yeah, it’s beautiful. My daughters love to canoe down that way. Yeah.
Yeah.
Gary Jenkins: It’s
Jimmy Easy: beautiful. Like I said, I live a normal life now. Pay my taxes. I don’t, I come out of my house, Gary, I’m not like this. Okay. I’m not wor- I come out, no worries. I got a circular… I’m on 10 acres. You know out here. Yeah. I’m on 10 acres. I live comfortable. I come out, no worries, nobody following me.
I ain’t worried about my phone bugged, my car’s bugged. When they arrested me on that case with Nicky and Lenny, they went back to my house. [00:26:00] They had bugs in the, some of the outlets all around the house.
Gary Jenkins: I know yeah.
Jimmy Easy: You know about where they put it. Oh yeah. They need the juice. They need a ground.
Gary Jenkins: Yep. Yeah, exactly. They, and they need that power- And then they took them out. They made sure of that … for the bug, so you don’t have to change the batteries all the time. That’s one thing people don’t understand. You have to go in there and you have to get a source of power, so you got it connected to your power, just like in a car, connected to your power.
Otherwise, you gotta go change the batteries all the time, and you don’t wanna do that, so yeah, it’s,
Jimmy Easy: No, getting in and out, you’re gonna get caught.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. That’s the most dangerous spot, ain’t it, when you’re going in and out. Now it’s-
Jimmy Easy: I’ll tell you an example. One day they had local guys pull me over.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. I’ve done that with the FBI.
Jimmy Easy: Listen to this. They pull me over, and I know what’s going on.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: License and registration. I says, “Officers, just for the heck of it, what the hell did I do?”
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: He s- he broke lane. Said, “Okay,” give him my license. Comes back, he says, “Can you step out of the car? Your c- your license is suspended.
I’m gonna take you in.” I had somebody in the motor vehicle. I [00:27:00] had all the licenses I wanted. I had the hook in the tag office.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, did you?
Jimmy Easy: Yeah. I’ll go and get it out if you want. And they take me in about an hour and a half later. “Sirocco, yeah, it was a mistake. It was an old ticket. You paid it. Da da.”
They give me back my beeper, my phone. Took it, boom. Took it, boom. And I said, “As far as the car, I’ll have a tow truck here to pick it up in a little while.” I sent it right to Bordentown, Pennsylvania auction and got rid of it. Yeah. You know what they did.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, I know what they did. That’s that’s interesting.
I- I’ll tell you a little story about myself. We were watching this guy, and he was talking to our head bookmaker in Kansas City, and they were drinking. I thought they were drinking a lot. So that guy leaves and we wanna see… We want to find out more about him. We didn’t know much about him. So I get a district car to go stop him.
I say, “Hey…” I tell the district car, I said, “Hey, he’s drunk. He’s… you need to take him in for DUI.” So they take him in for DUI, [00:28:00] and we go rummage through the car, and then they tow it. We go down to the station where they’ve taken him, , they’ve tested him. He wasn’t drunk. He didn’t test at all.
He had been… He was drinking water or something down there. Oh, that captain came out and he said, “What did you guys do to me?”
Jimmy Easy: So you were in Kansas City all your life?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Yes, I have.
Jimmy Easy: You know any, got any of the wiseguys from Cleveland?
Gary Jenkins: No, not really. I-
Jimmy Easy: You ever hear a guy named Joe Luce, AK- his name was Joey Kibachi?
No, I haven’t. He was the boss of Cleveland for a while. Oh. He was the bo- I was away with him. He’s a good guy. Oh, yeah. He died not too long ago, but I figure you’re in Kansas, you might have heard of him
Gary Jenkins: No, I had, we had a guy named Joey Cantalupo here for a while. He was he was connected to Colombo for quite a while.
He w- he was in this town for a while. We had, Yeah … Peter Savino was here until he died recently. Actually his testifying helped put away the Genovese boss that acted like he was crazy. All of a sudden I’ve lost his name now. Chin. The Chin. Chin. He helped put away The Chin.
He hid out here in Kansas City. He helped-
Jimmy Easy: Did he go [00:29:00] back home?
Gary Jenkins: What?
Jimmy Easy: Did- Did he go back home?
Gary Jenkins: No, he stayed here in Kansas City. I, I, after he died- A lot of people ask me- I don’t know what happened to him. I, he s- he created a life here. He had a business and everything.
Jimmy Easy: And that’s how it is with me here. I thought about moving to Florida after, the bad divorce when-
Gary Jenkins: Yeah
Jimmy Easy: the dust. My girls never knew about this. I would never gonna write a book, never do nothing. Our lawyer put my daughters on the stand and says, “How does it feel to have a father that’s a stone cold murderer?” My daughter said, “What are you talking about?” My daughters didn’t know nothing. We lived that normal life, go get ice cream, this.
We didn’t … There was nothing like that. We’d go on vacations. I was just, I wanted that 9:00 to 5:00 legitimate guy, no more worries.
And then she opened her mouth, and when my daughters were 18 and 16 at the time, the two older ones only, the little one I didn’t tell. And they asked me, and I said, “Yes, baby daddy, made a lot of stupid mistakes growing up.”
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. ”
Jimmy Easy: And I’m not proud of it. I never… I hid it from you, [00:30:00] not that because I lied to you. Because I love yous and I don’t want you to think bad of me.” And then because I waited 25 years to come out with everybody saying, “Oh, he’s a fraud, he’s a fake.” You know what? Any time everybody wants to put them up, I’ll put my paperwork up.
I’ll put it, I’ll put an unlimited amount up.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: Y- these guys will come out and they go right in a pr- on the, on to these programs, so they’re fresh. I’m 25 years in the witness. I flipped 25 years ago.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I had a kid the other day, in his page it was his, he had his what name was his page?
1993 he was born.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I left 25 years ago. He said he beat me up. So I’m thinking, I’m saying, seven and s- and 26, 33. He beat me up 25 years ago, he was eight.
Gary Jenkins: He was eight.
Jimmy Easy: He got these… I laugh at them. I love it.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I do. I lo- I get off on that.
Gary Jenkins: [00:31:00] So this has been really interesting. Tell us about your social media presence.
How can people find out what you’re doing and where you are?
Jimmy Easy: I’m on YouTube, Jimmy Easy Mafia Life, and then I’m on Instagram, Facebook. It’s all Jimmy_Easy_Sirocco.
But on YouTube, my YouTube page is Jimmy Easy Mafia Life
Gary Jenkins: Okay, and I’ll have links to those on the in the show notes, guys. Let’s see. I think I had one, one last question here,
John D’Amato was murdered. He was the boss of the Cavalcante family. What, yeah what is the story about that? Do you know anything about that? That’s a
Jimmy Easy: big question. See, D’Amato, and if you watch Hollywood Wade’s interview when he talks about what he said to the agent, ’cause I made a point to him.
I says, “So let me ask you a question. If your g- your girlfriend came to me and told me that we were going out, Swingers Club,” I said, “Why would she have that conversation with me? And you’re the boss. Why is your girl coming to me telling me about [00:32:00] swinging and this and…” They didn’t want D’Amato in there. I don’t care what they…
Rudy told me that, none of this. They wanted a guy named Corky Vastola in there. Corky and Rudy and… They were much closer.
With Johnny D’Amato, a- and when Wade brought this up to the agent, that made the case is that is a valid point. But the second part was Johnny D’Amato was taking a lot of money off the other five families to gamble, and he was putting the Cavalcantes in a bad hole.
That was the second reason why they killed him
Gary Jenkins: All right, interesting. And one other thing, I just thought about something. There, there was a, a, an enforcer up in Chicago named Harry Aleman and the, the story was if you just, if you’re collecting a debt and you just said Harry Aleman has part of this,” they would start paying up im- they, they would find the money.
Did you have that kind of reputation, or did you have somebody that was backing you that had that kind of reputation? You just dropped their name and people would up the money immediately or…?
Jimmy Easy: See, [00:33:00] in your neighborhood, like where we had the club on Fifth Avenue and 2nd Street, our neighborhood, you’re more known in your backyard.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: You know what I mean? If you take me and put me in the Bronx, who’s gonna know me? They take a Bronx guy, stick him in South Brooklyn, who’s gonna know him?
Gary Jenkins: Ah.
Jimmy Easy: So in your neighborhood, your people fear you more.
Gary Jenkins: Okay.
Jimmy Easy: You know what I mean? Yeah. But my neighborhood, like it was an after-hours in my neighborhood, and I shot a kid right in front of about 70, 80 people, and, everybody knew in the neighborhood, and I wouldn’t think twice of using it.
That was the idiot me.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. All
Jimmy Easy: right. Thinking you’re never gonna get caught. You put the bracelets on people.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: And I was that arrogant piece of shit.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: I got kicked down Central Book stairs. I got beat.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, really?
Jimmy Easy: Yeah, I was… And I wasn’t a big guy. I was just a wi- I would, I didn’t take bullshit.
Yeah. I’d rather take a beating before I take bullshit. That was the thing. My father told me, “You run away from a fight, I’ll beat your ass.”
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, I got [00:34:00] you. All right, Jimmy Easy. Give us, show us the book, and give us the name of this book again.
Jimmy Easy: Again, Hit Man: Tell All About the Mafia and the Witness Protection Program.
It’s on Amazon. Everything in here, Gary, is 100% truth.
Gary Jenkins: I believe it. I understand it Real
Jimmy Easy: facts of life
Gary Jenkins: I understand that you’ve been vouched for by some other Bob associates back east w- you just have to keep getting the word
Jimmy Easy: out And then Bob could just do a big thing on me
Gary Jenkins: Yeah
Jimmy Easy: That, ’cause one guy said, “Oh, is it…”
Then all of a sudden it came out.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jimmy Easy: You hide 25 years-
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, e- exactly … I don’t
Jimmy Easy: know if I changed that much. I got uglier.
Gary Jenkins: I- Yeah, that, and pe- people forget. And like most of the people you knew, they’re dead now, man. I think about the people I knew 25 years ago. That’s the scary thing They’re dead.
Yeah, I know. You live long enough, you outlive all your friends, man. And your enemies. I
Jimmy Easy: yeah.
Gary Jenkins: Jimmy, thanks so much for coming on the show
Jimmy Easy: It was a great, Gary, you’re a good guy to talk to. Anytime you want, call me [00:35:00] back.