1. Frank Salemme was raised in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston.
26 Facts About Frank Salemme
1. 2.
Frank Salemme served in the US Army during the Korean War and became a licensed electrician after receiving an honorable discharge.
3.
Frank Salemme married Alice Kathleen McLaughlin in Nashua, New Hampshire on November 16,1955.
4.
Frank Salemme began working for the family as a low-level associate after his release from prison.
5.
Frank Salemme operated a number of semi-legitimate businesses such as automobile repair garages in partnership with George Kaufman, who served as the liaison between the Mafia and Boston's Jewish bookmakers.
6.
Frank Salemme began associating with a group of gangsters from Boston's Roxbury neighborhood, which included his childhood friend Stephen "the Rifleman" Flemmi.
7.
Frank Salemme grew so close to Flemmi that he named his son Stephen Frank Salemme after him.
8.
Unknown to Frank Salemme Flemmi was a confidential informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation who provided the bureau with information on Frank Salemme and others in the Patriarca family.
9.
In 1968, Frank Salemme arranged the car bombing of John Fitzgerald, a lawyer representing Patriarca mob informant Joseph Barboza.
10.
Frank Salemme remained a fugitive until December 1972, when he was captured by FBI agent John Connolly on Third Avenue in Manhattan.
11.
Frank Salemme was convicted and sentenced to prison for 16 years.
12.
Two years later Steve Flemmi was immunized and told US attorneys Fred Wyshak and Brian Kelly that he saw Frank Salemme participate in the murder.
13.
Frank Salemme went back to jail when he was finished testifying against Connolly, and there he bragged to a fellow inmate that the prosecutors had coached him to commit perjury and that he had committed so much perjury that he should be sentenced to jail for a hundred years.
14.
In previous years, Frank Salemme had forged strong ties to Whitey Bulger and the mostly Irish American Winter Hill Gang.
15.
Frank Salemme was especially close to Bulger's lieutenant Steve Flemmi.
16.
In early 1989, soon after his release from prison, Frank Salemme attempted to gain control of the Patriarca family.
17.
Patriarca caporegime Joseph Russo opposed Frank Salemme's move, fearing the loss of his lucrative rackets.
18.
Gunmen then ambushed Frank Salemme, wounding him in the chest and leg.
19.
Just before midnight on August 11,1995, Frank Salemme was arrested in his pajamas by the FBI at his West Palm Beach home.
20.
On December 9,1999, Frank Salemme pleaded guilty to a racketeering indictment charging him with loansharking, extortion and four murders; those of Richard Grasso, and the brothers William, Walter and Edward "Wimpy" Bennett.
21.
Frank Salemme agreed to provide the government with information on the FBI handling of Bulger and Flemmi.
22.
In 2003, in return for assisting the government, Frank Salemme was released early from prison and brought into the federal witness protection program.
23.
Shortly after his release, Frank Salemme appeared before a Congressional committee to testify on the Connolly case.
24.
On June 22,2018, Salemme was convicted of the murder of Steven A DiSarro.
25.
Frank Salemme was later held at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners.
26.
On December 13,2022, Frank Salemme died at MCFP Springfield, at the age of 89.