Dominick Cataldo

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Dominic Joseph Cataldo-Cataldu (March 19, 1923 - April 27, 1997), known as Little Dom, was a Sicilian-American sidewalk soldier in the New York and Florida based Colombo crime family. He was known during his life time for being close friends to two mobsters-turned informants, Salvatore Polisi and Joseph Ianuzzi. He is the brother of Colombo crime family mobster Joseph Cataldo and in-law of mob boss Albert Anastasia. He is a blood relative of Tommaso Cataldo and Alphonse Cataldo. He is the father-in-law to Salvatore Scaglione and brother-in-law to Gambino crime family mobster Vito Scaglione and Frank Scaglione.

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[edit] Biography

Dominic Cataldo was trim little man who stood at 5'7 with a thick shock of straight black hair with sharp features on a constantly brooding, fleshy pugnacious unshaven face. He was fathered by Samuel Cataldo, a Sicilian immigrant from San Cataldo which is also pronounced San Cataldu in Sicilian, which is an Italian town and commune in the province of Caltanissetta. Dominick had rugged good looks and a "killer" engaging smile and a perpetual worried look on his craggy-looking face with tight clenched lips like Humphrey Bogart and heavy-lidded eyes like Robert Mitchum. He was brash, rebellious and sarcastic among friends with a horrible temper and possessed a raw sexual energy and magnetism when socializing with criminal associates. He had a fleeting facial resemblance to American actor John Garfield. Dominic was born in Lower East Side, Manhattan in a small apartment on Essex Street. He was raised in the criminal infested Lower East Side, Manhattan which was rife with up and comers in the La Cosa Nostra. Dominick was born two blocks from where his future friend and criminal accomplice Salvatore Polisi was born and raised. He was born in the same tenament house ghetto as his lookalike actor John Garfield. Dominick's father Samuel Cataldo was a Colombo crime family mobster who served under Joe Profaci in what would later be the Colombo crime family and had grown up together in the 1900's and The Depression's in Lower East Side, Manhattan and both pursued lives in organized crime. Dominick had a brother Joseph Cataldo born c.a. 1940 who also became a member of the Colombo crime family and married a woman named Louise Anastasia, who was a niece of Albert Anastasia. The Cataldo brothers' father Samuel had been involved in smuggling moonshine from New York City to Long Island in a horse drawn carriage and got Salvatore Polisi's father, Frank Polisi involved. His great uncle was a Colombo crime family mob associate who ran a funeral parlor on Glenmore Avenue where in an upper apartment the poet Gregory Corso would later be born in. The Cataldo and Polisi families became very close. When Salvatore Polisi's sister was born, his father "retired" from organized crime, but his brother, Anthony Polisi remained in "the life" and got his nephew Salvatore Polisi involved with Dominic Cataldo, who first met Anthony Polisi when he was arrested for counterfeiting. The elder Anthony Polisi was imprisoned for the attempted armed robbery of a bank. In 1972 Dominick Cataldo started an illegal bookmaking operation and casino out of an after-nights club located on 87th Street just across Atlantic Avenue, which was one block over and one block down from Salvatore Polisi's apartment on 95th Avenue and 88th Street. Among friends, to look at and socialize with, it was hard for people to believe that by 1973 Dominick had murdered over ten people. He is the godfather to Salvatore Polisi's younget son,Joseph Polisi. Dominick is not to be mistaken as a relative of Patriarca crime family mobster Anthony Cataldo. Dominick was married to a woman named Midge in the 1970s. He told his criminal friend and mobster informant Joe Iannuzzi that the solution to dealing with his wife's threats of divorce over his infidelities was to threaten to kill her mother and father. In the 1970's when Dominick became involved in drug trafficking he became addicted to cocaine along with his wife. He was very well respected by both the Colombo crime family and the Gambino crime family, especially Thomas Agro and Joe Ianuzzi.

[edit] Serial Killer Tendencies

As an associate for the Colombo crime family he had a favorite burial ground for his gangland executions. He had a certain hill that was next to the Taconic State Parkway, located roughly twenty minutes north of New York City. His favorite saying was, "I put him in Boot Hill". This is a reference to the popular nickname of many cemeteries, chiefly in the American West. Later he would retell Gambino Florida based gangster Joseph Ianuzzi a story about how he placed a corpse in a previously dug hole for burial. Cataldo was assisted that night by another individual who was also slated for murder. After the body had been dropped in the hole Cataldo realized that the duo had not removed the dead man of his personal effects such as money and jewelry. Cataldo then convinced this individual to jump down in the hole and relieve the victim. Cataldo then took the other's life, later stating that two were buried on The Hill that night.

[edit] Indictment and Incarceration

The "books" for membership into cosa nostra had been officially closed since the late 1950s. Following the death of Carlo Gambino in 1976, the last remaining mob boss to have decried such a rule, the books for proposed members were reopened. Cataldo received his membership into the Colombo family in the late 1970s. By now he had spending a portion of his time in south Florida with Ianuzzi, cultivating illegal narcotics sales and according to Ianuzzi had himself been sampling cocaine. Due to the testimony and evidence gathered by Ianuzzi during Operation Homerun, Cataldo was convicted for a host of racketeering crimes or RICO predicate acts. In 1985 he was sentenced to thirty-five years and within less than five years succumbed to cancer.

[edit] References

  • Taylor, Nicholas, Sins of The Father The True Story of A Family Running From the Mob Backinprint (August 2002) ISBN 0595240674
  • Schumacher, Michael, Dharma Lion : A critical biography of Allen GinsbergSt Martins Press (December 1994) ISBN 0312112637
  • Ianuzzi, Joseph, Joe Dogs: The Life and Crimes of a Mobster Simon & Schuster (June 1993) ISBN 0671797522
  • Raab, Selwyn QUEENS BARBER SHOT TO DEATH BY 3 IN MASKS The New York Times September 11, 1987
  • Dietche, M. Scott "The Beating of Joe Castellano" Rick Porello's Featured Article www.americanmafia.com 1999
  • Albanese, S. Jay Contemporary Issues in Organized Crime

[edit] External links

  • www.whiteywatch.com