Ilario Zannino was born in
Roxbury, Boston to Joseph Zannino and Isabella LaGrada and raised in a house on Shawmut Avenue in
South End, Boston. He stood at 5'7" and weighed 160 pounds with brown eyes and dark brown hair. Although he was born in the North End, like
Gennaro Anguilo he moved at an early age to
Franklin, Massachusetts. Zannino moved to South Boston in the late 1930s, and graduated from
Franklin High School in 1938. His relatives owned a pig farm in
Stoughton, Massachusetts where it was believed that the body of murdered
Greek-American mob associate James Bratsos was buried in 1954, although no one has ever been charged in the disappearance of Bratsos. In his high school yearbook, he stated intentions to attend medical school. His classmates called him "Zip" which later become ironically the same nickname of FBI Special Agent
John Connolly who would later successfully prosecute him for his criminal activities. Zannino later went by the alias "Larry Baione". He allegedly stabbed a waiter to death in a South End restaurant for slow service. He was classmates with a future elementary school principal named Larry who were in the "Let's Go" youth gang together. In 1954, Ilario attended his old friend Larry's wedding, pressed a $100 bill in his hand and said, "Buy yourself a necktie kid." Zannino rose from street tough to extorting businesses and beating up debtors all over town. In 1949, Zannino married Isabel Tawa (1924–2011), who worked as a saleswoman at
Gilchrist's department store and later owned and managed properties in
South Boston. He and his wife had four children; Joseph (1951–2021), Lorraine, Karen, and Jayne. In a 1981 conversation with
Donato "Danny" Angiulo, which was covertly recorded by the
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Zannino agreed that a
Mafioso's wife is "not supposed to know what you do for a living" and claimed that his wife knew only that he had a secret hiding place in his house, saying: "After all, Danny, when you got three million ... dollars you can’t be too secretive. And you know, Danny, good wives don’t want to know what ... you do". On April 7, 1966, Zannino was introduced to Erwin Soroko at the Intermission Lounge in Boston by the bar owner Joseph Balliro as a potential buyer of stolen jewelry in Soroko's possession. Zannino agreed with Soroko that his appraiser, Lewis Strauss, would examine the jewelry. The following day, Strauss appraised the merchandise at the
Northwood, New Hampshire cottage where the jewelry was hidden and, after brief negotiations, reached an agreement with Soroko on a price of $60,000 and returned to Boston with the jewelry. Soroko subsequently received payments personally from Zannino and his associate Peter Limone on two occasions. Later that year, Soroko was convicted in state court of the March 24, 1966 robbery of Cortell's jewelry store in Boston, which brought the stolen merchandise into his possession. He was sentenced to ten to twenty years in prison. In 1970, Soroko and his wife Joanne served as the chief prosecution witnesses in a federal trial in which Zannino, Limone, Strauss and Balliro were convicted for transporting or aiding and abetting the transport of goods in interstate commerce knowing the same to have been stolen. Zannino was an extortionist, and his victims at one time included Gennaro "Jerry" Angiulo, who made a payment to
New England Mafia boss
Raymond "the Man" Patriarca to have Zannino's shakedown ceased. Zannino then went on to work for Anguilo as an
enforcer. Zannino was also a close associate of
Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi, an FBI
informant who was connected with Italian organized crime in Boston's
North End as well as the
Winter Hill Gang, an
Irish mob group in
Somerville. He courted Flemmi for
membership in the
Mafia. Along with Patriarca family
soldier Joseph "J.R." Russo, Zannino was dispatched by Jerry Angiulo to assassinate
Joseph "The Animal" Barboza, a former Patriarca enforcer and hitman who testified for the government against the New England Mafia and became the first person to enter the
Federal Witness Protection Program. Barboza was living in
Santa Rosa, California under the alias "Joe Donati" when he befriended James Chalmas, a small-time criminal originally from South Boston who tipped off Angiulo about Barboza's whereabouts. On February 11, 1976, Barboza was shotgunned to death from a passing van as he approached his parked car after leaving Chalmas' apartment in the
Sunset District of
San Francisco. The identity of Barboza's killers remained unknown until Zannino was
secretly recorded by the FBI talking about the murder in 1981. During a conversation with two Patriarca
soldati ("soldiers"), he explained his decision to recommend Russo for a promotion, describing him as "a very brilliant guy, who stepped right out with a
carbine" during the Barboza murder. He further stated: "We clipped Barboza. I was with him [Russo] every day. He made snap decisions. There, he couldn't get in touch with nobody. And he accomplished the whole pot."
Racketeering conviction In 1981, FBI agents acquired details on the interiors of two Mafia controlled apartments in the North End. With court approval, agents picked the locks early in the morning and planted covert listening devices that produced over 800 hours of recordings. Between January and May 1981, the FBI secretly recorded 850 hours of conversations after planting bugs at Zannino's headquarters on North Margin Street and at Jerry Angiulo's "Dog House" on Prince Street. During one conversation, Zannino recounted his and Joseph Russo's roles in the Joseph Barboza killing of 1976. In another discussion, he and Angiulo recalled the murder of another underworld figure, Walter Bennett, by
Frank Salemme. Zannino repeatedly asserted that he was unfit to stand trial due to heart problems, a claim that was overruled by federal judges. The prosecution contended that he had suffered only one heart attack in 1977, and that his condition had since been treatable with medication. Three hours after the beginning of the racketeering trial of Zannino and five co-defendants in the Federal District Court in Boston on the date of July 11, 1985, Zannino collapsed, complaining of chest pains, forcing judge
David S. Nelson to halt the proceedings. Zannino was subsequently hospitalized at the
Massachusetts General Hospital. Sent to prison for
loansharking and
illegal gambling, Ilaro Zannino died on February 27, 1996, of natural causes at the
Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in
Springfield, Missouri. ==Bibliography==