Francis Patrick Salemme (pronounced sah-LEM-ee; August 18, 1933 – December 13, 2022), sometimes spelled Salemmi, also known as "Cadillac Frank" and "the General", was an American mobster from Boston, Massachusetts who became a hitman and eventually the boss of the Patriarca crime family of New England before turning government witness.
Early life Salemme was born on August 18, 1933, in Weymouth, Massachusetts, in the Greater Boston area, the second of six children of an Irish American mother, Mary Agnes (née Hagerty), a homemaker, and an Italian American father, Romeo Pasquale Salemme, a ship painter.Became New England's crime boss by default: Francis 'Cadillac Frank' Salemme (1933-2022) Thomas Hunt, The American Mafia Frank Salemme, One-Time Head of the New England Mafia, Dies at 89 Clay Risen, The New York Times (December 21, 2022) ‘Cadillac Frank’ Salemme obituary The Times (December 29, 2022) His younger brother, John, also became a mobster.Salemme pleads guilty to illegal gambling charges Las Vegas Sun (November 28, 2000) Salemme was raised in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston.'Cadillac' Frank Salemme Boston.com (December 31, 2003)
Salemme served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War and became a licensed electrician after receiving an honorable discharge. He married Alice Kathleen McLaughlin in Nashua, New Hampshire on November 16, 1955.
Criminal career
While in prison in 1957, Salemme became acquainted with Anthony Morelli, a member of the Patriarca crime family which controlled organized crime throughout New England. He began working for the family as a low-level associate after his release from prison. Salemme operated a number of semi-legitimate businesses such as automobile repair garages in partnership with George Kaufman, who served as the liaison between the Mafia and Boston's Jewish bookmakers.The Boston Roxbury Italian Gang War Matt Connolly, Medium (December 1, 2022) Salemme earned the nickname "Cadillac Frank" when he worked in an auto repair shop and specialized in repairing Cadillac automobiles.Mob boss Francis ‘Cadillac Frank’ Salemme dies in prison aged 89 Ramon Antonio Vargas, The Guardian (December 19, 2022)
Salemme began associating with a group of gangsters from Boston's Roxbury neighborhood, which included his childhood friend Stephen "the Rifleman" Flemmi. Salemme and Flemmi formed a partnership, and the duo became enforcers, bookmakers and loan sharks for the Patriarca family caporegime Ilario "Larry Baione" Zannino in the North End of Boston. Salemme grew so close to Flemmi that he named his son Stephen Salemme after him.Howie Carr: ‘Cadillac’ Frank’s snakebit son Howie Carr, Boston Herald (November 22, 2024) Unknown to Salemme, however, Flemmi was a confidential informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who provided the bureau with information on Salemme and others in the Patriarca family.United States of America v. Francis P. Salemme Casetext (December 23, 1999)
During the early 1960s, Salemme participated in the Irish gang wars in Boston, allying himself with the Winter Hill Gang against the Charlestown Gang. Testifying before Congress in 2003, Salemme admitted to murdering numerous rival gang members in Charlestown, Massachusetts:
The Hugheses, the McLaughlins, they were all eliminated, and I was a participant in just about all of them, planned them and did them.
In the summer of 1967, Zannino and Peter Limone decided to sponsor Salemme and Flemmi for membership in the Patriarca family. Although prospective members would ordinarily be required to carry out a murder in order to be inducted into the Mafia, the family offered to waive the requirement due to Salemme and Flemmi's reputation as seasoned killers.Emily McIntyre and Christopher McIntyre v. the United States Casetext (September 5, 2006) While Salemme was unequivocal in his enthusiasm for joining the Patriarca family, Flemmi had an ambivalent relationship with the Mafia. Salemme's partial Irish ancestry ultimately prevented him from becoming a "made man", however.When & Where Did Fmr. Mob Don Cadillac Frank Salemme Get ‘Made’ Into The New England Mafia? Some Say Boston, He Said Providence Scott Burnstein, The Gangster Report (February 13, 2022)
In 1968, Salemme arranged the car bombing of John Fitzgerald, a lawyer representing Patriarca mob informant Joseph Barboza. The point of the attack was to scare Barboza into not testifying against Raymond Patriarca and other mob leaders. Fitzgerald survived the attack, but lost his left leg. It was later established in testimony by several witnesses and confirmed by the U.S. House of Representatives Organized Crime unit investigation that Salemme was involved in the bombing, but did not carry it out. After the unsuccessful attack, Salemme went into hiding using the identity of "Jules Sellick", a reputed Philadelphia jewelry salesman. He remained a fugitive until December 1972, when he was captured by FBI agent John Connolly on Third Avenue in Manhattan. He was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to 16 years in state prison in 1973.
Mob rivalry
Salemme was released from prison in February 1988 after serving almost 15 years of his sentence.Reputed mob figure injured in murder attempt (June 16, 1989) At the time, the Patriarca family was in the midst of a generational transition and leadership struggle. Raymond Patriarca Sr. had died of a heart attack in 1984, and in 1986, underboss Gennaro "Jerry" Angiulo was sent to prison on racketeering charges, leaving a power vacuum in the crime family.The Patriarca Purge Of The 1990s: New England Mafia War Murder Timeline (Cadillac Frank’s Revenge) Scott Burnstein, The Gangster Report (August 16, 2016) Salemme was a pivotal member of a faction loyal to Raymond "Junior" Patriarca Jr., who succeeded his father as boss of the New England Mafia. Salemme also maintained links to the Winter Hill Gang led by James "Whitey" Bulger and Stephen Flemmi, to whom he was especially close. The Providence, Rhode Island-based Patriarca Jr. isolated the crime family's Boston faction headed by Joseph "J. R." Russo,Patriarca Listening Party: Boston FBI Bugged Mob Making Ceremony In October ’89 Scott Burnstein, The Gangster Report (October 28, 2019) and he relied on Salemme and New Haven, Connecticut mobster William "Billy the Wild Guy" Grasso for protection.Cruel Summer: Flames Of Discontent Raged In New England Mob Circles In Summer Of ’89 Scott Burnstein, The Gangster Report (May 16, 2018) Salemme's ties to the Winter Hill Gang made him particularly valuable to Patriarca Jr., who appointed him his point man in Boston.
Although Salemme had previously been restricted from joining the Patriarca family as a "made" member because of his partial Irish ancestry, the threshold for membership in the organization was later reduced as a result of the decimation of the crime family's ranks by law enforcement and infighting. Salemme was inducted into the Patriarca family during an initiation ceremony conducted by Raymond Patriarca Jr. in Providence in July 1988. By 1989, he had been promoted to caporegime.The Last Big Rhode Island La Cosa Nostra Trial Begins Today Go Local Prov (May 9, 2018) Among other criminal activities, Salemme oversaw a "crew" which identified and extorted bookmakers and loansharks in Framingham, Worcester, and Milford. He was often accompanied by his son, Frank Salemme Jr., who was also inducted as a "made man".Former mob boss charged with lying about 1993 killing Denise Lavoie, The Standard-Times (November 9, 2004) Salemme and underboss Grasso became the de facto leaders of Patriarca Jr.'s wing of the crime family.
In early 1989, soon after his release from prison, Salemme attempted to gain control of the Patriarca family. Patriarca caporegime Joseph Russo opposed Salemme's move, fearing the loss of his lucrative rackets. In June 1989, Angelo "Sonny" Mercurio, a Russo loyalist, lured Salemme to a meeting outside a Saugus, Massachusetts IHOP. Gunmen then ambushed Salemme, wounding him in the chest and leg. The feud between Salemme and Russo continued until John Gotti, the boss of the New York Gambino crime family, brokered a peace agreement. Under the agreement, Salemme loyalist Nicholas Bianco became boss and Russo became consigliere. By 1991 Salemme, with the support of Bulger and Flemmi, had become the de facto boss of the Patriarca family.
In Southern California, Salemme Sr. and his son ran up more than $55,000 in bills at various hotels, which they avoided paying thanks to a scam operated by San Diego attorney Fred Henry Arm.S.D. Attorney Convicted of Defrauding 4 Hotels Jim Herron Zamora, Los Angeles Times (January 28, 1992)
Mob boss
During the 1990s, at the urging of Frank Salemme, Jr., Frank, Sr. started extorting money from a film crew that wanted to avoid paying high salaries to union workers while filming in Boston and Providence, Rhode Island. As it turned out, the film crew was actually a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) front. These events were highly fictionalized in the 2004 film The Last Shot. At the end of the operation, Frank, Sr. was arrested in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and charged with racketeering, crossing state lines for criminal activity, extortion, conspiracy, and loansharking.
Salemme financed a deal to take over The Channel, a nightclub and music venue in the Fort Point neighborhood of South Boston, using club and restaurant owner Stephen "Stevie" DiSarro as a straw buyer. While the deal was pending, the club's owners, Harry and Pete Booras, allowed DiSarro to take over the running of the club as manager, with Frank Salemme Jr. as assistant manager in September 1990. After the sale was completed and the venue was reopened as strip club Soiree in early 1992, Salemme and DiSarro reneged on an agreement allowing the Booras brothers a minority stake in the business, instead giving the minority ownership interest to South Boston crime lords Whitey Bulger and Stephen Flemmi, who assisted in ensuring that the club received zoning, licensing and permitting from the local municipality.Changing The Channel: How Boston Mob Took Control Of Southie Night Club & Fallout Led To Owner’s Killing Scott Burnstein, The Gangster Report (April 30, 2018)
Downfall In April 1994, a joint task force of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Massachusetts State Police, and the Boston Police Department launched an investigation into the gambling operations of the Winter Hill Gang.Photos: Who's Who in the Bulger Case WCVB-TV (June 25, 2011) By the end of the year, the task force had amassed enough evidence to indict Salemme, Bulger and Flemmi on 35 counts of racketeering and extortion.Galway native set to testify against Bulger in murder trial Pierce O’Reilly, The Irish Echo (February 16, 2011) On December 23, 1994, Bulger and Flemmi's former FBI handler, John Connolly, tipped off the gangsters about the impending indictments,Mobster tells of gang payoffs to FBI United Press International (May 16, 2002) prompting Salemme and Bulger to flee Boston.