Lucchese crime family Brooklyn faction

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Lucchese crime family Brooklyn faction" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

The Lucchese crime family's Brooklyn faction is a group of Italian-American mobsters within the Lucchese crime family that control organized crime activities in the New York metropolitan area but are predominantly based out of Brooklyn and Staten Island. The Brooklyn faction was created after two separate crews in the Lucchese family were merged together. The merger occurred during the early 2000s, when the Lucchese family administration decided that Vario Crew Caporegime Domenico "Danny" Cutaia would also take control of the 19th Hole Crew. The Lucchese family administration saw the 19th Hole crew without leadership because it had been crippled by numerous indictments and informants during 1990s, leaving many members imprisoned. After the merger of the two crews, the Lucchese Borgata referred to this crew as the Brooklyn faction.

Before the merger the Vario Crew, sometimes known as the Canarsie Crew, had predominantly been based out of Brooklyn neighborhoods of Canarsie and Flatlands. The crew was controlled by Caporegime Paul Vario during the early 1960s into the early 1980s, when Vario, Jimmy Burke, and a number of other associates were imprisoned, primarily due to the testimony of another long-term associate, Henry Hill. The life story of Hill's time with the Vario crew was the subject of Nicholas Pileggi's book Wiseguy and Martin Scorsese's crime film adapted from that book, Goodfellas (1990), starring Ray Liotta as Hill. After Vario's imprisonment, Alphonse "Little Al" D'Arco became the new caporegime of the crew. During the early 1990s, D'Arco worked closely with family boss Vic Amuso and Underboss Anthony Casso, following their orders having numerous murders committed. In 1991, D'Arco became the family's acting boss when Amuso and Casso went into hiding, but D'Arco eventually feared for his life and became a government witness. The crew was then taken over by Domenico "Danny" Cutaia, who was able to bring back some stability. Cutaia would continue to control the crew until he stepped down for health concerns in late the 2000s.

The 19th Hole Crew, sometimes called Bensonhurst Crew, was based out of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn before it was merged into the Brooklyn faction. In the past, the crew was controlled by Christopher "Christie Tick" Furnari and then by his protege Vic Amuso. In 1986, Vic Amuso became the new boss of the family and promoted his close ally Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso to Caporegime of the crew. Under Casso's leadership the Bensonhurst crew would be responsible for 100 murders making it the most violent and bloodiest reigns in Lucchese family history. In 1993, Casso was imprisoned, and he became one of the highest-ranking members of the Mafia to turn informant. After Casso's defection much of the crew's leadership was imprisoned and eventually the crew was merged with the Vario Crew creating the Brooklyn faction.