Top Mafia boss reveals he had to ‘look over his shoulder’ for years after leaving the mob
23 June 2022, 19:18
Andrew Marr speaks to former high-ranking Mafia member
A top Mafia boss has revealed how he was forced to watch his back for years after leaving the mob.
Former Mafia capo Michael Franzese made a series of frank admissions about organised crime in an interview on Tonight with Andrew Marr.
Michael, now 71, left the Mob after falling in love, turning his back on a life of crime saying “it was very destructive to families.”
“Life was being devastated. A lot of guys were going to jail for long periods of time, but the real catalyst was that I met a woman and fell in love, and I didn’t want to put her through that lifestyle.
“I just wanted to walk away. It wasn’t easy because you are not allowed to do that but I was able to.”
He explained that he took an oath to become a made guy and became a captain in the mob, with his crew bringing in between eight and 10million dollars each week.
“In the ceremony, you take an oath, they draw some blood from your hand and you take the oath of omertà.
“Once you take that oath you become a soldier, a made man in that life,” he said.
But he broke the oath when he took the decision to leave a life of crime behind him.
I just wanted to walk away. It wasn’t easy because you are not allowed to do that but I was able to. Normally you don’t just walk away.”
Michael said for several years after he left he was “looking over his shoulder.”
“I never sold my former associates short. Just about everyone I ran with was either dead on in prison.
“I just about outlasted everybody. I’m not nervous, I don’t live in fear but I don’t take things for granted. When I go to New York I watch out where I go.
“I had a big crew, I had my own jet plane, I had houses in three states. We were bringing in between 8 and 10m dollars a week.
“There were some good times but you take the good with the bad.”
He said the portrayal of the Mafia in films films does damage to young people by glamorising the lifestyle.
Young people “only see the good parts,” he said. “They never see the end of the movie where they end up in jail.”
“It is damaging to them, no doubt.”
Michael is touring the UK to give a series of talks on his life in the Mafia starting at the Grosvenor House hotel on July 2 and 3.
