Product Description

Anthony 'Gaspipe' Casso, former head of the Lucchese family, is currently serving 13 life sentences at a federal prison in Colorado. Now, he has given bestselling author Philip Carlo the most intimate look into the world of La Cosa Nostra ever seen. Casso concocted ingenious schemes to hijack trucks, rob banks and traffic vast quantities of marijuana and heroin - shattering the myth that the Mafia didn't handle drugs. He also worked with the other Mafia families and forged strong ties with the Russian mob. He was bringing in so much cash that he had dozens of large safety deposit boxes filled with bricks of hundred-dollar bills. But there was tragedy, too, and it ate away at the seemingly bulletproof Casso, who loved his family but ultimately questioned his choices in life. The law finally caught up with him in his New Jersey safe house in 1993 and, rather than stoically face the music like the old-time mafiosi he revered, Casso became the thing he hated - a rat. Detailing Casso's feud with John Gotti, the 'Windows Case' that led to the beginning of the end for the mob in New York, and Casso's dealings with the NYPD Mafia cops, Gaspipe is a chilling and illuminating roller-coaster ride into a netherworld few outsiders have ever dared to enter.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #82315 in Books
• Published on: 2008-08-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 368 pages

From the Back Cover
FINAL COVER BLURB

`This powerful story is required reading for anyone with a yen for the Mafia, the criminal underworld and a law enforcement system struggling to keep up' ± Publishers Weekly

Anthony ‘Gaspipe’ Casso, former head of the Lucchese family, is currently serving 13 life sentences at a federal prison in Colorado. Now, he has given bestselling author Philip Carlo the most intimate look into the world of La Cosa Nostra ever seen.

Casso’s life with the Mob was preordained. His father introduced the young Anthony to the ‘men of honour’ who did business by shaking pinkie-ringed hands – hands equally at home gripping the cold steel of a silenced pistol. The budding mobster watched and listened, and decided that he would devote his life to crime.

Casso concocted ingenious schemes to hijack trucks, rob banks and traffic vast quantities of marijuana and heroin – shattering the myth that the Mafia didn’t handle drugs. He also worked with the other Mafia families and forged strong ties with the Russian mob.

He was bringing in so much cash that he had dozens of large safety deposit boxes filled with bricks of hundred-dollar bills. But there was tragedy, too, and it ate away at the seemingly bulletproof Casso – a man who loved his family but ultimately questioned his choices in life.

The law finally caught up with him in his New Jersey safe house in 1993 and, rather than stoically face the music like the old-time mafiosi he revered, Casso became the thing he hated – a rat.

Detailing Casso’s feud with John Gotti, the ‘Windows Case’ that led to the beginning of the end for the Mob in New York, and Casso’s dealings with the NYPD Mafia cops, Gaspipe is a chilling and illuminating, unvarnished and entertaining roller-coaster ride into a netherworld few outsiders have ever dared to enter.

`The inside information about the lifestyle, rituals, killings and betrayals is priceless' – Kirkus Reviews

About the Author
Philip Carlo is the author of the bestselling true-crime biographies The Night Stalker and The Ice Man. He lives in New York.

Customer Reviews

A good read
A good read but a bit longwinded. Enjoyed the book but found my mind wandering during some of it.What a bunch of snitchers the mafia ended up being, all these confessions of books are all about those who ended up telling all in the hope of getting a shorter sentence. This is another.
Most mafia or murder buffs will enjoy this, it is one of the better tales.

woeful
i have read pretty much every mafia book going and this was without a doubt the worst, most badly researched and least factual tome i have ever had the misfortune to pay for.
there is no detail whatsoever. there are something like 72 chapters with so little detail in each it makes a mockery of the term true crime.
no mention of why and how casso was thrown out of the witness protection programme or any detailed analysis of his own court case.
no index either and that tells you all you need to know about a so called non-fiction true account.
full of simple errors, non sequiturs and cliches.
perhaps gaspipe himself had final copy approval because there is no other explanation for the blatant glossing over of all casso's degeneracy.
anyone reading the book would think casso was an honourable man caught out by turn coats, snitches and the greed of other men.
the fact is he was an informer who gave up the store before securing a binding agreement from the government. carlo shown no recognition of the irony that the duplicitous streetsmart Casso was completely had over by the government. the hawk becomes the pigeon as it were.
i agree he was treated unfairly by the reneging government but it was hardly surprising.
the term is i believe poetic justice.
none of this comes through from the book which is low on factual content and high on repetitive cliche.
in short: all filler, no thriller

Hilarious.
I bet you all thought that Casso was a psychopathic murdering parasite who destroyed the Lucchese family and grassed up all his former colleagues?. Well, this book explodes that myth.

Casso was in fact a master criminal, a genius, who the Luccheses were very lucky to have on their books. He was also very handsome. He was a family man who loved animals. He was forced into his way of life due to the nasty discrimination against Italians. He was a man of honour, brought up on the old school principles of La Cosa Nostra. Did I mention he was incredibly handsome? Casso was universally respected by fellow mafiosi. He only used violence when absolutely necessary. Etc etc .....

Worth a read if you want to understand how deluded mafia types would like to perceive themselves!