- Theresa Ferrara
Theresa Ferrara (1952 –
May 18 1979 ) was anItalian-American Lucchese crime family associate who eventually became aninformant for theFederal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Born in theFive Towns area ofLong Island, New York , Ferrara was a distant relative ofNew Orleans crime family bossCarlos Marcello . As a young woman, Ferrara moved from Long Island toOzone Park, Queens to pursue a career as afashion model oractress .Mob connections
With her natural blonde hair and deep suntan, Ferrara soon attracted the attention of Lucchese mob associate
Tommy DeSimone . In 1972, Ferrara and the married DeSimone started an affair. Ferrara started frequenting mob hangouts such asRobert's Lounge andHenry Hill 'sThe Suite . Around this time, Ferrara became a drug seller, dealing small quantities ofcocaine andQuaaludes to DeSimone and other Lucchese mobsters. Ferrara also opened a mob-fundedbeauty salon inBellmore, Long Island . However, Ferrara soon started dealing cocaine out of the salon itself. In summer 1977, Ferrara was arrested after selling drugs to an undercoverDrug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agent. Faced with a lengthy jail sentence, Ferrara became a co-operating witness for the authorities.In 1978, Ferrara and mob associate Richard Eaton allegedly conspired to swindle the Lucchese family out of $250,000 of cocaine from
Fort Lauderdale, Florida . Ferrara and Eaton were also suspected of stealing a fair portion of money taken during the famousLufthansa heist atJohn F. Kennedy Airport in Brooklyn.. None of this was ever proven by theFBI . However, in early 1979, Ferrara moved out of her dumpy duplex in Queens into a thousand-dollar-a-month penthouse apartment inManhattan .Government informant
From 1977 to 1979, Ferrara was the government's eyes and ears on Lucchese
caporegime Paul Vario . Her information was responsible for exposing a major cocaine deal onNovember 11 ,1978 . The Coast Guard and DEA agents confiscated thirty tons ofcocaine on theFlushing, Queens waterfront. However, they were unable to catch the smugglers, who were allegedly Vario,Jimmy Burke andTom Monteleone . Vario was furious at the undercover drug sting operation that cost him and Burke $25,000. At some point, Vario or someone in the Lucchese family started to become suspicious of Ferrara. It also did not help Ferrara that she knew about the Lufthansa heist at a time when Burke was systematically eliminating many of the participants in that robbery.Death
On
February 10 ,1979 Ferrara received a phone call at her salon. She told her nineteen-year-old niece Maria Sanacore that she had to meet someone at a nearbyLong Island diner. Ferrara asked Sanacore to come looking for her at the diner if she did not return in fifteen minutes. Before leaving the salon, Ferrara left behind her purse, the keys to her 1979Chevrolet Corvette C3 , and hermink coat . The last words Ferrara spoke to her niece were, "I have a chance to make $10,000 dollars." Ferrara never returned from this meeting.On
May 18 ,1979 adismember ed female torso was found floating in the waters offBarnegat Inlet nearTom's River, New Jersey . Anautopsy performed at the Toms River Community Hospital confirmed through recentbreast augmentation surgery that it was the body of Theresa Ferrara. No one was ever convicted of her murder.In popular culture
*Ferrara is portrayed in the 1990 film "
Goodfellas " as "Rosie" byIlleana Douglas .
*In the television movie "The Ten Million Dollar Getaway", Ferrara is portrayed as "Theresa" by actressKaren Young .
*Theresa Ferrara is not to be mistaken for Theressa Bovina, a childhood acquaintance of Henry Hill who was rescued by mobsters during an attemptedmugging in 1966.External links
* [http://glasgowcrew.tripod.com/bosslist.html International Mafia.com]
References
*AmericanMafia.com "26 Mafia Cities Milwaukee, WI" by Jay C. Ambler 2000
*Pileggi, Nicholas, "Wiseguy: Life In A Mafia Family", Corgi (1987) ISBN 055213094X
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