It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these, but Mafia Takedown by Mike Campi seemed worthy enough to dust off my login information and write something. The book had a troubled rollout. Initially born out of an earlier collaboration between former FBI Agent Campi and ex-Genovese associate Michael “Cookie” D’Urso, that promised a full suite of media products including movies and TV shows based on their story; their relationship broke down following a mysterious lie that D’Urso insisted on inserting. Unfortunately, we never get to find out what it was. Campi pressed on with a new iteration of the story, now co-written with Dan Dorsky with the duo even going through a whole press tour and appearing on VladTV to promote their joint effort. Yet due to another mysterious circumstance, Dorsky dropped out of the project with Campi having to “refresh” the manuscript, once more, now under a solo effort. Ultimately, it was well worth it, and we should all be glad Campi persevered to deliver this book to us. Though not without its flaws, the book does contain a wealth of new and fresh information on the 1990s and early 2000s mob and helps fill in gaps in the now slightly less mysterious Genovese Crime Family. I think for anyone interested in this topic, this book would make for a nice addition to this year’s holiday reading list.

In terms of books and other reading material, the 1990s does feel like a lost decade, being overshadowed by the 80s and with more recent cooperators picking things back up in the new millennium. The ever-shadowy Genovese Family, as always, suffers most acutely from this problem due to a lack of turncoats. This book helps fill in some of those gaps, because even before Cookie cooperated in the late 90s, Mike Campi, as part of FBI squad C-5 covering Vito’s Family, was intimately familiar with the hierarchy and was knee-deep in an investigation that sent the active administration of the time away. In fact, the book can be divided into two sections: Mike’s initial investigation and arrest of the Genovese hierarchy in 1996 and Campi’s and Cookie’s (sounds like an ice cream flavour) collaboration to repeat that feat (on a much grander scale) in 2001. The latter, naturally, made up the majority of the book, but really the entirety of the 1990s was covered and we learned about induction dates and ceremonies, who was in the administration when, inner and outward politicking, as well as the Genovese’s relationships with other Families. Even though the story was largely told by D’Urso’s relationships through Sammy “Meatballs” Aparo’s crew, Vincent “the Chin” Gigante was the main character of the book, with Barney Bellomo almost acting as the side-villain/apprentice and it was at times quite entertaining.

The best thing going for this book is that for decent portions of it, the stories were told through the words of the wiseguys that experienced it. There were endless quotes and transcripts of conversations from mobsters themselves, as they were caught on wires or bugs, telling their perspectives on events, motivations, and other characters. From word choices and answers, it really helped add depth to their character and made it feel like you got to know them a little bit better, not just in a factual way, but on a more human level. Given how hard and expensive it is to get transcripts from the FBI/DoJ/NARA, I’m glad he gave us so much for a comparatively small price.

While this book was rather longer than usual (hate the 200-page book trend these days) it was really easy to read, and I breezed through it in just a couple of days. The prose and writing style were very informal, casual, and relatable. In between tales of heroic Mafia investigations, Campi dropped small anecdotes of managerial incompetence that plagued his professional life that rang too close to home. It helped break down the main story beats into more digestible sections.

One nuisance that persistently haunted this book was just how preachy Mike Campi was. The first ~15% or so was filled with what seemed like an unending rant on the rotten nature of the mob, how it is full of lies, hypocrisy and betrayal. The author beat up on a straw man that he created and lamented how people viewed the mob as this honoured bound group, men following a code of their own who don’t harm society and blamed the media and Hollywood for perpetuating these stereotypes that brainwash young men into joining these gangs. The Godfather was, of course, brought up to support this argument, conveniently ignoring how the most popular portrayal of this phenomenon in the last 25 years and what young people might actually be familiar with was The Sopranos which hit our heads over and over with the message of how ruinous this lifestyle is and how at the end of the show (spoiler alert!) everyone basically died. This tirade made the initial part of the book annoying to read and I kept wondering when we we’re going to get to the actual good stuff, aka real mob stuff. To its benefit, Mike toned down the preachiness as the book went on and kept it to a minimum which made any further flashes of it more tolerable. I’d honestly recommend starting the book on Chapter 5 to avoid this irritation and the following problem.

Another flaw this book has is that Campi wasted time recounting ancient history which took focus away from the present. In certain cases, it worked, such as when he recounted George Barone’s history within the Genovese Family, his importance regarding the ILA, and inter-Familial politics. All of that set the context and helped readers understand Barone’s situation in the 2000s and the significance of his eventual cooperation. What didn’t work, was when the word count was wasted on such things as the origin of the Five Families or the Castellammarese War. It’s not just that we read those things a million times before, it’s that some of the basic facts mentioned as part of those recountings were wrong, such as the suggestion that Joe Gallo had anything to do with Albert Anastasia’s murder (Edmond Valin debunks that here). Those basic errors unfortunately take away from the credibility of this book and the expertise of Mike Campi. I do not doubt that the information regarding the 1990s and early 2000s is probably all correct, but the further he goes back in time, the more readers have to question the reliability of the information they are reading. It just sucks to see that some of these stubborn myths refuse to die and that even successful FBI Agents like Campi who have firsthand knowledge of organized crime repeat them.

Overall, this is a pretty good book that I would recommend adding to one’s collection. Campi is a solid professional with an interesting life story and we’re all the better for it that he had a chance to share it with us. While it’d be great to hear from Cookie D’Urso himself and get his perspective on the story, I feel like between his trial testimony and this book, we’re in good shape if he decides to go the way all those Bonanno cooperators went (Joe Massino, Frank Coppa, Lino, etc.) and not put his pen to paper. Now with great patience, I await the new Vic Orena book by Larry McShane…

That is it from me and as always thank you for reading if you have managed to get this far down the page. Please visit r/Mafia discord, the Black Hand Forum, and JoePuzzles’s Western LCN-focused site.