The leader of the Patriarca crime family, Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme, passed away at age 89.
The former New England Mafia boss was dying in prison while serving a life sentence for the 1993 murder of a Boston nightclub owner.
Online records of the Federal Bureau of Prisons show that he passed away on Tuesday.
Salemme passed away at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, according to prisons spokesman Donald Murphy who talked to USA TODAY.
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Murphy stated that the administration “does not divulge facts regarding the cause of death for any inmate” due to safety, security, and privacy concerns.
Salemme, who oversaw the Patriarca crime organization in Boston in the early 1990s, later assisted prosecutors in convicting a dishonest FBI agent after learning that other mobsters had been talking about him to law enforcement.
When the nightclub owner’s remains were discovered in 2016, Salemme was residing in Atlanta as Richard Parker, making the old ex-Mafia boss once more a government target.
Salemme’s 2018 trial served as a throwback to a time when the mob in New England was a powerful and feared force. Salemme insisted he had nothing to do with the death of Steven DiSarro, but he was found guilty after his former closest buddy gave a defiant witness statement.
A Car Bombing And A Lost Leg
Salemme took part in many murders during the gang battles in Boston in the 1960s and was sentenced to 16 years in prison for attempting to murder a lawyer whose car was blown up in 1968 but who survived but lost a leg. Salemme suffered significant injuries in a shooting outside a pancake shop in a Boston suburb after being released from jail.
When he, infamous Boston gangster James “Whitey” Bulger, and other defendants were accused in a significant racketeering case in 1995, his reign as Mafia leader ended. After John Connolly Jr., Bulger’s FBI handler informed them of the imminent indictment, Salemme and Bulger escaped.
Bulger spent 16 years on the run before being apprehended at 81 in Santa Monica, California. A few months later, he was detained in Florida. At 89, Bulger was murdered in prison by his fellow inmates.
Stephen “The Rifleman” Flemmi, Bulger and Salemme’s best friend, was found to have been an FBI informant in the racketeering case. Salemme, angry that his fellow mobsters had turned on him, decided to confess and work with the police.
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