Joseph "Joe" Barbaro (8 March 1920 - ?) was a soldato in the Moretti crime family. Originally part of the Clemente crime family, Barbaro and his partner Vito Scaletta would become two of the most notorious gangsters in New York City during the 1950s. After his and Scaletta's assassination of Don Carlo Falcone in 1951, the two were separated and Scaletta was led to believe his friend had died, but in reality, Barbaro became a bodyguard for longtime mobster Leo Galante.
Biography[]
Barbaro was born on March 8th 1920 to a lower class Italian-American family in Little Italy, New York City. As a child, he became a rash and volatile delinquent, forming a small gang of neighborhood thugs which would soon be joined in by Vito Scaletta, a poor immigrant boy and Barbaro's future best friend. The two began committing petty crimes together, but their relationship was severed once Scaletta was arrested after he and Barbaro tried robbing a jewelry store in 1943, for which the former was called to military service in World War II.
Beginnings[]
Barbaro in 1945
While Scaletta was away at war, Barbaro began making his way up the New York City underworld, forming connections with several Mafia families, primarily the Clemente crime family through soldato Henry Tomasino. His newfound status awarded him a life of luxury, with an expensive apartment in Manhattan and a plethora of prostitutes at his side. In 1945, after Scaletta returned home on a one-month leave from the Army, Barbaro arranged for him to stay by forging false discharge documents. Afterward, he introduced him to the Clemente family, and he, Scaletta and Tomasino did multiple robberies and heists on the orders of Don Alberto Clemente, one of which was foiled during an altercation with the Irish O'Neill Gang and its leader Brian O'Neill. Afterward, Barbaro and Scaletta were given the contract on Clemente associate Sidney Pen by capo Luca Gurino as a way to get made; Barbaro, Scaletta and Tomasino cornered Pen at his distillery, where Barbaro shot him dead, though Tomasino received a bullet to the leg.
In February 1945, Scaletta was arrested for distributing stolen gas stamps, and Barbaro silenced the witness set to testify against him, though Scaletta was nonetheless sentenced to 10 years in prison. Then, he was sent to kill another turncoat, Richie Mazzeo, who could potentially incriminate the entire family hierarchy, which he did after tracking him down to where the authorities were hiding him. After learning of Scaletta's stiff sentence despite his efforts, Barbaro confronted Gurino, who subsequently ordered him killed. Barbaro then spent five years in hiding in the American South, returning to New York in 1950 through Moretti family soldato Tony Balsamo. Now unwelcome with the Clementes, Barbaro proved his loyalty to his new boss Carlo Falcone by killing his traitorous underboss Rocco Marino, and in return, Falcone resolved his dispute with Gurino, firmly cementing him as an essential asset.
Made man[]
Barbaro in 1951
After Scaletta's release from prison in May 1951, he and Barbaro were selected to become made men in the Moretti family with the support of Vinci family consigliere Leo Galante, being inducted by Falcone. As one of their first assignments, they were ordered to kill Alberto Clemente, planting a bomb in the conference room of his hotel then chasing him down the street where Barbaro shot him to death, though Barbaro's young friend and fledgling mobster Marty Santorelli was killed in the crossfire. Shortly after, Barbaro and Scaletta decimated the last remnants of the O'Neill Gang after new leader Mickey Desmond burned Scaletta's house down. With Scaletta now broke, he and Barbaro attempted to strike new lucrative business deals, and at the recommendation of Tomasino, got into a partnership with the drug trafficking Triads so they could make large quantities of money. They began distributing the narcotics on the street, but soon Falcone demanded a $60,000 cut, and to make matters worse, the Triads mauled Tomasino to death in front of Barbaro and Scaletta after discovering his role as an informant for the Bureau of Narcotics. Barbaro convinced Scaletta into taking revenge immediately, and they both drove to the Triad hangout in Chinatown where they engaged in a violent shootout, killing many of them. After learning Tomasino was an informant from Triad enforcer Zhe Yun Wong, Barbaro killed him. The attack on the Triads in turn soured their relationship with the New York Mafia families, believed to be the culprits, and kicked off a war for retaliation.
Still destitute and with a $55,000 debt to pay to loan shark Bruno Levine, Barbaro and Scaletta decided to take up a contract by Falcone's underboss Eddie Scarpa to kill the Chicago Salieri family informant Tommy Angelo as a favor to Don Ennio Salieri, then serving a life sentence as a result of Angelo's testimony. Barbaro and Scaletta tracked him down to his suburban home, where they relayed Salieri's message before Barbaro killed him with a shotgun. Later that day, Barbaro and Scaletta were kidnapped by Don Frank Vinci, who blamed them for the conflict with the Triads. Though they managed to escape, Barbaro was gravely injured, and had to be treated by Mafia doctor Andreas Karafantis. With the brutal gang war Barbaro and Scaletta started now taking over the streets of New York City, the FBI began turning their attention to the crime families and looked to convict the bosses for their activities, so in a last ditch effort to both end the war and the crackdown on them, Leo Galante told Scaletta to kill Carlo Falcone on Vinci's orders. Scaletta ambushed him at his observatory after killing his men, but was surprised to see Barbaro was waiting for him, having seemingly joined Falcone's side in taking him out in exchange for a capo's position in the family. However, Barbaro let Scaletta know that they would kill Falcone together, and after the two engaged in a shooting with him, Scaletta finished him with a bullet to the head, capping off the families' tension.
Fate[]
Barbaro in 1968
After Falcone's murder, Barbaro and Scaletta were ready to return to business as usual with Leo Galante, but he insisted the two be driven in separate cars, though they didn't suspect anything of it. Barbaro was driven off the main road in a vehicle with Vinci's men, with Galante revealing to Scaletta that he wasn't part of their peace agreement, which convinced Scaletta that he would never see his friend again. According to Scaletta's later sources, Barbaro was taken in to answer for his involvement in the Mafia war with the Triads, but apparently managed to overpower his captors in the process, escaping to Chicago where he turned to some people he knew for help. Scaletta then heard Barbaro's friends in Chicago turned on him, beating him to death and cutting off his hands, though a body or any other trace were never recovered to identify him. Apparently, Barbaro actually ended up working for Galante, who kept him around as his guard and part of his entourage.
In 1968, Barbaro accompanied Galante to a face-to-face meeting with Lincoln Clay, the new crime boss of New Orleans after his murder of Sal Marcano, with Galante giving his blessing for Clay to run business as he saw fit, with the cache to always kick back a monthly 20% of his proceeds to the Commission.