Michael Sabella
American mobster
Michael "Mikey Cigars" Sabella (1911–1989) was an American mobster who was a caporegime in the Bonanno crime family of New York City and a relative of Philadelphia crime family boss Salvatore Sabella.
Biography
Early years
Born in Little Italy, Manhattan to Sicilian parents from Castellammare del Golfo. He was a close relative of Castellammarese mobster Dominick "Mimi" Sabella and his brother, the early Philadelphia crime family boss Salvatore Sabella. Mike Sabella became a soldier for the Bonanno family serving under boss Joseph Bonanno in 1957. He was involved in gambling and loansharking during the 1950s.
Before the Bonanno wars of the 1960s, Sabella had been a soldier first in the crew of fellow Castellammarese Carmine Galante and later under Joe Notaro, both top Joe Bonanno loyalists. During the conflict between the Bonannos and Gaspar DiGregorio, Mike Sabella initially remained loyal to the Bonanno faction, but eventually the Commission convinced him to join DiGregorio's group. As a result, he was rewarded with a promotion to capo of his old crew.
Sabella worked closely with Nicholas Marangello, Galante's underboss, and became a close confidant to his former captain Carmine Galante, who by the mid-1970s had become the street boss of the organization. Sabella's crew was among the largest in the family, with interests stretching from Manhattan and New Jersey area down to Florida.
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This entry incorporates text from “Michael Sabella” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.