Dominick Petrilli

Dominick "The Gap" Petrilli (died December 9, 1953) was a New York mobster in the Lucchese crime family.^[1] He was an early associate of mobster/government witness Joe Valachi.

Petrilli got his nickname "The Gap" after losing two front teeth knocked out in a childhood fight. Petrilli first met Valachi in Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York. Once both men were released, Petrilli reportedly sponsored Valachi for membership in Gaetano Reina's criminal organization. During the 1920s, Reina was allied with Masseria, a powerful and ambitious New York gang lord. When Reina began exploring different alliances, Massseria murdered him in February 1930 and installed a loyalist, Joseph Pinzolo, as boss of Reina's gang. Pinzolo's appointment inflamed the Reina gang and on September 5, 1930, Petrilli murdered Pinzolo. As a result of these actions, New York was plunged into the Castellammarese War.

In 1931, Petrilli and Valachi, became bodyguards to Castellammarese leader Salvatore Maranzano. After the end of the war Petrilli stayed in the Lucchese crime family, while Valachi joined the Genovese crime family.

In 1942, Petrilli was arrested in Tucson, Arizona on narcotics charges and sentenced to five years imprisonment. Petrilli would inform on several organized crime figures and associates shortly before being deported to his native Italy by federal authorities. In 1953, after illegally reentering the U.S, Dominick Petrilli was murdered in a bar in the Bronx by three gunmen.

References

Notes

1. ^ Maas, Peter The Valachi Papers pg.212

External links

• The American "Mafia": Who was Who ? - Dominick Petrilli
• Crime Library; Valachi, the Apprentice
• Mafia.com: This Week in Mob History

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Name	Petrilli, Dominick
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Date of death	December 9, 1953
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