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Santo Trafficante Jr. (November 15, 1914 – March 17, 1987) was among the most powerful Mafia bosses in the United States. He headed the Trafficante crime family from 1954 to 1987 and controlled organized criminal operations in Florida and Cuba, which had previously been consolidated from several rival gangs by his father, Santo Trafficante Sr.
Mar 15, 2017 · Santo Jr., who had inherited the leadership of the Tampa Mafia around 1950 when his father, Santo Sr., fell ill, had now completed his consolidation of power in Tampa and beyond. Over the next 30-plus years, Trafficante, Jr. rose to oversee Mafia operations across the state of Florida.
- The Rise of Mafia Don Santo Trafficante
- From A Prince to A Kingpin
- The Silent Don’s Cuban Connections
- Santo Trafficante’S Plots to Kill Fidel Castro
- A Conspiracy to Assassinate John F. Kennedy?
- The Testimony of Santo Trafficante
Born in Tampa, Florida in 1914, Trafficante hailed from a family already deeply involved in organized crime. Like many of the most prominent mobsters of the 20th century, his father, Santo Trafficante Sr., grew up in Sicily, Italy but became a major player in the criminal world after migrating to America. As such, Trafficante Sr. controlled gamblin...
In 1950, the aging Trafficante Sr. began to slow down. He sought treatment for stomach cancer and was ready to hand power over to a trusted lieutenant. Who better than his son, Trafficante Jr., to inherit his throne? Trafficante Sr. passed away four years later, leaving Jr. his Tampa and Cuba-based criminal empire. While the senior Trafficante had ...
When Fidel Castro began his ascent to power in the 1950s, Santo Trafficante feared the radical Marxist revolutionary wouldn’t cooperate with him. He was right, and when Castro took power in 1959, Trafficante’s burgeoning gambling-and-drugs empire went under siege. Trafficante tried to win Castro over to his side, but that didn’t work. Trafficante h...
Trafficante’s chance came in the 1960s when he became acquainted with mobster John “Handsome Johnny” Roselli. Claiming association with the CIA, Roselli knew of Trafficante’s vendetta and told his new pal that the U.S. government also wanted to take down Castro’s Communist regime. Getting in bed with Trafficante and other leading members of America...
The American government’s close ties to Santo Trafficante Jr. and the Mafia didn’t end with their attempts to kill Castro. In the 1960 presidential election, Kennedy family patriarch Joe Kennedy Sr. used his ties to organized crime to secure votes for his son, John F. Kennedy. According to the account of Judith Exner, however, one of JFK’s many mis...
Fifteen years following the assassination, Trafficante testified in front of the United States House Select Committee on the murder of JFK in exchange for immunity. The chairman cited a confession from Roselli that Trafficante’s allies organized a sharpshooter, Lee Harvey Oswald, to take out the President. But before Trafficante testified, someone ...
- Carly Silver
From ruling Cuba's casino scene to alleged ties with the JFK assassination, this video delves de...more. Born in Tampa and rising to be one of the most influential Mafia bosses, Santo...
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Santo Trafficante Jr. is considered one of the most powerful mobsters in history. Trafficante controlled organized crime in Tampa for more than 30 years and for a time had extensive operations in Cuba as well.
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Mar 19, 1987 · TAMPA, Fla. — Santo Trafficante Jr., believed to be one of the last of the old-time Mafia dons and a shadowy figure questioned in both the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and a plot on...
