Tom Papania

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Tom Papania (name changed from Thomas Anthony Papanier) is a Christian evangelist. Papania claims that before his conversion, he was a high-ranking enforcer in the Gambino crime family. However, his account is questioned by many:

noted Mafia expert and founder of Ganglandnews.com, Jerry Capeci,
writer Rocky Scarfone, who claims that many of the stories Papania tells as his own were stolen from his own autobiography, House of Cards: The Curse of Alphonso
Wayne Robinson and Brian Karjala who have researched and posted information, email, official U.S. Government documents, and certified arrest and imprisonment records concerning Papania at The Rogues Gallery.

[edit] Papania's claimed history

According to Papania's claims, he grew up in an Italian (Sicilian) family in New York City. The son of a laborer, Tom did not realize until his teens that his late grandfather on his mother's side was Joe "The Boss" Mazaria whom the FBI claims originally brought the mob overseas from Europe. Due to a lack of a purposeful relationship with his father, Tom went on to a life of crime in his mid-teens. For example, after donning a ski-mask and robbing the corner cafe, a hangout for Italian gangsters, Tom's instinctively insisted that they remove their pants—a further disrespect—so they couldn't chase him. Sometime later—Tom states in his messages—three men in black showed up at his home to inform him and his parents that they believed it was Tom who had robbed them and that the only reason he was still alive was due to the respect they had for his grandfather. They warned him that if it happened again, not even the respect for his grandfather could save him. Tom explains that he never even knew of his grandfather and that after this meeting, his dad severely chastened him and warned him not to speak with these men again. Tom said he was thick headed and having believed that his dad never showed him compassion—he didn't take Tom to ball games and never referred to him as a "son"—at the next opportunity, he went to those men and demanded to know who his grandfather was. This is how Tom's story begins of his induction into the mafia to become the 3rd highest member under Carlo Gambino. Tom says he was an efficient collector; he threatened people with ice picks or harm toward their family in order to collect on their debts.

The mafia is like a war, inside and out. Externally they are on constant surveillance by police, and internally there are always members who seek to dethrone those in authority at any expense. Tom states that attempts were made on his life at least three times; for example, once they kidnapped him, tied him up in a warehouse and set fire to it, but somehow he always managed to escape.

According to Papania, he was, as the ultimate test, ordered to shoot some out-of-state men who robbed the garment district. He was told that the inside men were takin care of, but they wanted to make an example for the guys on the outside by having them shot in the legs. Tom says that he did as ordered, but that when he got in the airplane to head back to New York, the only people in the airplane were police who put him under arrest for the shooting of those men whom, Tom says, he had not even heard of their names until after his arrest. Tom vowed to keep silent and said nothing before the sentencing judge who gave him the maximum penalty, 5 to 7 years.

After being released on good behavior five years later, Tom was asked to see his Capo (boss of the family). In a meeting with him, he was asked what he thought about for the past five years: Tom had wondered what he had done wrong to get caught. The men explained to him that it was they who had turned him in as a test of his character, and that he had passed the test—"welcome to the family, Son."

Tom's anger must have boiled but it all simmered down at the sense of belonging to a family for the first time. He says the Gambinos offered him anything out of the "black book" to have control over. Since Tom liked a few of the discothèques, he asked for a couple of days to think it over. The story goes, Tom was given all three of these for his faithful service.

Regardless of all the millions of dollars he was making, Tom says there remained a vacuum in his life. Papania claims that after his conversion to Christianity, he told Paul Castellano, the current boss at the time, that he was leaving the mafia. Castellano, according to Papania, had a contract on Tom's life until John Gotti took over in December of 1985.