By Sharon Oliver
Contributing Writer
MEDFORD – While New York City is typical thought of as the stronghold of the Mafia in the United States, the Massachusetts mob had one dubious distinction over their New York brethren. It was in 1989 in the city of Medford, just north of Boston, that the FBI captured the first and only Mafia induction ceremony on tape.
Peacemaking gesture
New England crime boss Raymond “Junior” Patriarca wanted to make peace with a renegade faction that had killed a family underboss in Connecticut and wounded another mobster outside a Saugus pancake house. Patriarca wanted to baptize four new members into the fold and start afresh. Unbeknownst to him and other wise guys, Angelo Mercurio, a mob soldier and FBI informant, was about to break their code of silence. After being shown where certain mobsters would be “made,” Mercurio made a phone call and tipped off FBI agents John Connolly and James A. Ring on an upcoming induction ceremony.
After receiving a weekend furlough from a state prison to attend “family business,” Vincent Federico borrowed his sister’s home at 34 Guild Street in Medford where he, along with Robert “Bobby” DeLuca, Richard Floramo and Carmen Tortora were inducted on October 29, 1989. The four men took a blood oath after pricking their trigger fingers, burned holy cards, and pledged their loyalty and their lives to the Mafia. Unbeknownst to them, FBI agents posed as utility men had run a wire the night before from that house to a home owned by an agent who coincidentally lived on the same street.
Patriarca told the men that they came highly recommended, did everything they had to do, stayed the course but to not let it go to their heads. He warned against taking advantages to make money or abusing people and if they didn’t let it go to their heads or abuse it, they will have a “happy, happy, happy, life.”
Words of warning
Biagio DiGiacomo, a capo born in Sicily, administered the oath in Italian and offered words of warning such as the only way out was death and “there was no hope, no Jesus or Madonna who could help them if they ever shared this secret with anybody. This Thing cannot be exposed.”
Consigliere Joseph “RJ” Russo asked Tortora if had any brothers. Russo spewed loyalty scenarios to which Tortora replied, “yes” he would kill his own brother if he were a rat or cause any of them harm and “yes” he would leave his dying mother if called to “family” emergency.
Meanwhile, at the surveillance post on Guild Street, agents had photographed the men arriving and departing. After indulging in a little wine, dinner and discussion of mob rules, Russo and Ferrara stayed behind to scoop up crumbs and open the windows to air out any smell of smoke before the owner returned home. Just before locking the door, agents heard Ferrara say, “Only the {expletive} ghost knows what really took place over here today by God.”
Evidence in trial
During a later criminal trial, a defense attorney’s motion to suppress the tapes was denied. Prosecutors argued that the tapes were essential in proving that Mafia, also known as La Cosa Nostra, Italian for “This Thing of Ours” existed and were engaged in racketeering, under federal law. The hierarchy of the New England mob and many of those present on that October day were indicted and sentenced to prison.
In 2004, Robert Parisien, the FBI agent who planted the bugs that yielded the recording of the Mafia induction ceremony, died while scuba diving near Kettle Island off Massachusetts. The cause of death is believed to have been a heart attack.
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