Thomas DeSimone
American mobster (1950–1979)
Thomas James DeSimone (June 6, 1946 – disappeared January 14, 1979) was an American criminal associated with New York City's Lucchese crime family who is alleged to have participated in both the Air France robbery and the Lufthansa heist. It is believed DeSimone was responsible for participating in at least 5 murders, from William "Billy Batts" Bentvena in 1970, Michael "Spider" Gianco in 1970, William Reckhow in 1970, Ronald "Foxy" Jerothe in 1974, and Parnell "Stacks" Edwards in 1978. DeSimone went missing in 1979 and is believed to have been murdered, as a result of the murder of Bentvena in June 1970. DeSimone had not been given permission from the Lucchese family or the American Mafia Commission to murder Bentvena as he was a formally inducted member of the Gambino family, and was subsequently murdered as the
disposition of this sequence.
DeSimone's career in the Lucchese family is explored in the book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi, and inspired the character of Tommy DeVito, portrayed by Joe Pesci, one of the main characters of the 1990 film Goodfellas.
Early life
DeSimone was born in New York City, in the South Ozone Park area in the borough of Queens, on June 6, 1946, the youngest of eight children born to Robert Anthony DeSimone and Camilla Passerelli. He had four elder sisters and three elder brothers. Two of his brothers were associates of the Gambino crime family; Anthony was murdered by mobster Thomas Agro in 1979. One of his sisters Phyllis was a mistress of James Burke from the time she was aged 16. DeSimone was also the brother-in-law of mobster Joseph "The Barber" Spione, who was slain for refusing to help kill DeSimone in the late 1970s.
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This entry incorporates text from “Thomas DeSimone” 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.