Carmine Cuneo (1883-1955) was the Don of the Cuneo crime family, the second-most powerful of New York's "Five Families".
Biography[]
Carmine Cuneo was born in Sicily, Italy in 1883, and he later emigrated to New York City, New York in the United States, where he ran a fleet of milk trucks from The Bronx. Cuneo used this as a front for his growing criminal empire, as he built the Cuneo crime family into one of New York's "Five Families" during the 1930s. Cuneo was never suspected by the NYPD of being a criminal, and he showed restraint in his support of Virgil Sollozzo's narcotics business, as he refused to sell drugs to children. In 1946, he sided with the fellow bosses against the Corleone crime family in the Five Families War, during which the Cuneos went so far as to launch an attack on the Corleone Compound itself. After the death of Sonny Corleone in 1948, Don Vito Corleone put an end to the war, although the violence continued as Aldo Trapani continued to take out high-ranking Cuneo made men. In 1955, Cuneo's own son Marco Cuneo was murdered by Trapani.
Death[]
Cuneo's death
For his part in the conspiracy against the Corleones, Cuneo was targeted by the Corleones during Michael Corleone's 1955 purge of the family's enemies. As he exited the Savannah Hotel in Midtown Manhattan, Cuneo was trapped in the revolving door by Corleone hitman Willie Cicci, who jammed the doors. A trapped Cuneo was shot through the glass four times, and Leo Cuneo succeeded him as boss.