Cesare Bonventre (1 January 1951-April 1984) was a Sicilian caporegime in the Bonanno crime family of New York City.
Biography[]
Cesare Bonventre was born in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, Italy in 1951, the nephew of John Bonventre and a cousin of Joseph Bonanno and Baldassare Amato. He became a member of the Sicilian Mafia before Bonanno crime family acting boss Carmine Galante brought Bonventre to New York City in the United States to become his bodyguard. In 1979, he and Amato deserted Galante when three ski-masked men shot Galante dead at a Bushwick Italian restaurant (they were also alleged to have turned on Galante during the hit), and, in 1981, he served two months in prison for carrying illegal firearms in his car. Bonventre, nicknamed "the Tall Guy", became a capo at the age of 28, and he made a fortune from smuggling heroin into New York through pizza parlors. By 1984, his increasing wealth and fearsome reputation alienated the new Bonanno boss Joseph Massino, who decided to eliminate Bonventre. In April 1984, Salvatore Vitale and Louis Attanasio executed Rastelli as he drove into a glue factory in Wallington, Bergen County, New Jersey. His remains were discovered in two glue drums at a Garfield, New Jersey warehouse on 16 April 1984, over a week after Bonventre went missing.