Scott Hoffman's Inside: A Unique Perspective on Mob Life

The central theme of this podcast episode revolves around the profound experiences of Scott M. Hoffman, who offers a unique perspective on life within the organized crime milieu, particularly as the son of a high-ranking mobster. He shares harrowing anecdotes from his youth, including witnessing acts of violence and navigating the complexities of dual existence as both an observer of the mob lifestyle and a typical child. The discussion highlights the stark realities associated with such a life, contrasting the glamorous portrayals often depicted in popular media. Hoffman also emphasizes the importance of making informed life choices, drawing from his own decision to pursue an education rather than follow in his father's criminal footsteps. This episode serves as a poignant reminder of the consequences of crime and the resilience of the human spirit amid adversity.

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Takeaways:

• The podcast discusses the profound impact of witnessing violence at a young age, particularly in organized crime settings.
• The emotional weight of feeling like an observer in a violent world is elaborated upon by Scott Hoffman.
• Scott Hoffman's experiences reveal the stark realities of mob life, including the brutal enforcement methods used.
• The conversation touches on how popular media often glamorizes the mob lifestyle, neglecting the true brutality involved.

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
You are seen.
You are worthy.
You are not alone.
The world loses one person tosuicide every 40 seconds.
Let's change the stats together.
We can say, not suicide.
Not today.
Welcome to True Crime Authorsand Extraordinary People, the podcast

(00:26):
where we bring two passions together.
The show that gives newmeaning to the old adage truth is
stranger than fiction.
And reminding you that thereis an extraordinary person in all
of us.
Here is your host, David McClam.
What's going on, everybody?
And welcome to another episodeof True Crime Authors and Extraordinary
People.
Of course, I'm your man, David McClam.

(00:49):
Hey, if you guys haven'talready, make sure you follow us
on all of our social media.
One link to a link tree iseverything you need to know pertaining
to the show.
All right, before we getstarted, as you heard at the top
of the show, if you aresomeone who is considering hurting
yourself or someone else,please go and call on dial 988.
You can do that by textmessage or by phone call.

(01:12):
Nothing is worth your life.
And if no one's told youtoday, you do matter.
All right, so some trigger warnings.
We will be talking about themob here today in detail.
You'll probably be talkingabout some murders if these are triggering
to you.
We understand if you cannotlisten to this episode, but today
is author day.
I have a good one for you today.

(01:32):
Let me introduce to you who he is.
So his name is not a name thatis listed in any court records or
historical documents about theMafia, but he was in the room when
meetings took place.
He saw street enforcers andjuice collectors deal out punishment.
And he interacted with thereal goodfellas and godfathers, including

(01:53):
notorious gangsters HenryHill, Tony Accardo, and Sam Giancana.
He witnessed his first murderas a little boy and was asked to
get rid of the 22 silencer.
He worked during college atsocial clubs run by the Lucetchi,
Colombo and Bonanno crime families.
And he heard many stories fromhis father, who spent over 55 years

(02:15):
in the family business, risingup to be a conciliary.
For Giancana, he had to make adecision when he graduated college.
Will he live a straight andclean life or will he spend his life
being chased by the FBI,competing mobsters, and fellow gangsters.
His book is a work ofhistorical fiction that ties in true

(02:36):
events and real hitmen andtells a unique story of the hardships,
consequences, and rewards ofliving the life.
He is the author of Inside.
Please welcome Scott Hoffman.
Scott, welcome to the show.
Thank you, David.
I'm glad to be there.
I am honored to have you here,my friend.
Before we begin, is thereanything else that we should know

(02:59):
about Scott Hoffman?
Know that Scott Hoffman didnot get involved as a participant
in organized crime.
I was an observer.
That's what I told my father.
I'll be an observer.
And people ask, what's the difference?
I said, the difference is youcan't get invited as an observer
because you're notparticipating, but you're watching.
You're seeing, but you're not participating.

(03:22):
So just to kind of give theaudience who may not know a lot about
the mob, There is actuallyfive main mob families in America
at least.
There's the Gambinos, Luce,the Genovese, the Bonanno and the
Colombo families.
A lot of people know theGambinos because of John Gotti.
Now, your father was a part ofthe outfit.

(03:44):
Now, I've never really heardthat name before.
Was it all of themcollectively, or how did that work?
The families you discussedwere New York families.
Okay.
The outfit was Chicago.
That was something different.
That was, you know, hadnothing to do with New York in that
sense.
They were their own family.
And that was.
That was really the difference.

(04:05):
Each major city would havetheir own crime family, but they
all didn't inter.
Tie, you know, together.
They would be part of a.
What is known as a Mafia commission.
Chicago had a seat on thecommission, but each one ran, you
know, separately, of course.
Oh, that's good news.
I didn't know any of that before.
I thought that those fivefamilies was it.

(04:26):
I didn't really know thatthere was a separate chapter for
Chicago and things of that nature.
Oh, no, no, it wasn't.
Well, you've taught mesomething here today.
Because a lot of familiesreported to the.
Oh, I see.
I see.
So I have read.
Started reading that.
Your book.
It is wonderful.
You start out by telling uswhat it was like growing up when
your dad just came and prettymuch said, hey, I'm going to show

(04:48):
you what it actually is liketo live this life.
Can you describe to me, theaudience, what it was like to grow
up with your dad being in themafia in the 50s and 60s.
Wow.
And 70s.
It was very hard because Istarted very young, his approach
with me.
My father had the plan for Las Vegas.
Seven hotels and seven casinos.
Okay.
And when I was eight yearsold, I started going maybe five times

(05:11):
a year with them.
His approach with me was thathe wanted me to see everything go
in with my eyes open, ifthat's my decision.
But I would make the decision.
He Wasn't grooming me.
He just wanted me to see everything.
And I saw all facets of moblife, all facets.
So, you know, basically it wasmy decision.
But the reason why it was sodifficult is I'm seeing things at

(05:35):
a young age.
Most guys, when they go intomob life, they drop out of high school.
They might be 18.
They're not 8 years old.
They're not 9 years old seeingtheir first murder.
They're not 11 years oldseeing a guy's hands cut off.
They're not 12 years oldseeing a guy's head taken off.
Same guy who cut the guy'shands off.
They're not seeing all theviolence I'm seeing.

(05:55):
And they're not really tryingto relate with the classmates in
school, kids in theneighborhood who, you know, had a
norm, what I would call anormal type life.
So I'm really leading twodifferent lives.
And it was often difficult in school.
I'll give you an example.
When I was in fourth grade,they were teaching us multiplication

(06:15):
tables.
And the teacher writes on theboard six times five.
And I'm kind of lookingaround, I see it on the blackboard,
but I'm looking around and theteacher calls on me and says, scott,
how much is six times five?
And I say, oh, it's 30.
She says, that's correct.
You write 30.
And the reason I'm lookingaround, because six times five was

(06:36):
used in long sharking.
There's all different ways forloan sharking.
And what it meant was that ifI came to you, David, for a loan,
the principal would be 500,but the interest was 600.
So the actual amount that youowe the next week was 1100.
Well, if you come in for 500,where are you going to get the 1100

(06:59):
the next week?
And it would double up.
So, of course, that's what I'mthinking when I see six times five
on the blackboard.
So it was, you know, like Isay, it was difficult from that respect
because my father said, youcan never tell anybody because if
you tell one person, that oneperson can hurt you.
So I'm leading really twodifferent lives, and it was difficult

(07:21):
because of that.
I never had a kid's life.
I never had birthdays.
I never learned how to ride a bike.
My father never took me to abaseball game.
No, we didn't do any of that stuff.
Everything we did was mob related.
There's, in my end of life, asmob life is called, there's only
one free day.

(07:41):
One free day.
And I'll tell you about thatin a second Thanksgiving, Christmas,
I was out with my fathercollecting money.
We start at 1:00 onThanksgiving and maybe go to about
8, 8:30 on Christmas.
My father would say, let'swait till 1:00 so the kids can see
their presents.
And on Christmas day we're outcollecting money, okay, so the one

(08:03):
free day, the only day thatnothing ever happened, no one got
beat, no one got shot, wasMother's Day.
Everybody went to see mom, everybody.
So my father, during the weekbefore Mother's Day, he would buy
candy, you know, and, and thenhe would, that Sunday of Mother's
Day, we'd start out six in themorning and go to a florist and get

(08:25):
flowers.
So with the candy Fannie Mae,we would stop at homes.
Either they were the wives ofguys who were away or they were the
mothers of guys who were in afederal facility because the children
would never know.
They'd be always told, yourfather's going away to college or
your father has an out of town job.

(08:46):
Now, you know, it's not goingto take you 15 years to get your
bachelor's degree, okay, and.
But the kids never knew wheretheir father was.
Okay, but we're going to these houses.
And of course my father wouldtry and make a good day for these
people, at least for that.
So they were always very thankful.
But that was a long process.

(09:07):
But that was Mother's day.
Then at 12:01am Monday,Mother's Day is over, all the action
begins.
If guys are going to get shot,that's all happened then that's when
it's back to normal.
Was like, you have yourweekend, you do your weekend activities
and Monday is back to work.
That's how it was the dayafter Mother's Day.

(09:29):
Now you did something that alot of young boys don't do.
What was it like for you thefirst time when you walked into that
strip club that your dad tookyou to and he started talking to
you about the mafia and whatwas behind the scenes of all of that?
When you first walked in atthat young age, what'd you think?
Well, it was very hard becauseI never would see, you know, I'd

(09:50):
seen women like that.
And my father was the type ofguy, if you think about a sporting
coach, every day they'rehaving practice with the team and
they go over and over and over things.
That's how my father was with me.
We would constantly go overand over and over.
We were going to the stripclub because the street tax on a
strip Club was 10%.

(10:10):
So we were there to collect money.
Okay?
That's really what it's all about.
Because in mob life, the firstquestion today is about money.
The last question is about money.
Every conversation involvedabout money.
And that's what it was all about.
When my father developed LasVegas, the outfit at its time, at
its height, had $200 millionthat was coming in from all illegal

(10:36):
activities.
Las Vegas brought in 100 million.
And there's a mob rule.
Every mob family follows it.
Whether it was the outfit,Detroit, Cleveland, Boston, New York,
Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, youknow, anyone was that cops and kids
are off limits, not women.

(10:57):
Cops and kids are off limits.
In other words, leave them alone.
That rule is not going toapply to me because my father was
bringing in 50% of the totalrevenue of what the outfit was collecting.
So that didn't apply to me.
I wasn't a kid as far as theywere concerned.
So we briefly touched on it.
But you did witness your firstmurder on your ninth birthday.

(11:18):
And then you witnessed a headdecapitation at 12.
Can you tell us why thathappened and what did it do to you
as a young man at that time?
Well, I was very excited thatday because that was my ninth birthday,
okay?
And I'm so excited, I figuredmy father says, Sam Giancana is going
to give you a present.
When?
And he had told me, you know,on Thursday.

(11:39):
So Friday, a mobster who woulddrive for Sam Giancana, Chucky English,
was in the apartment in thefront room when I came home from
grammar school.
And my father says thatChucky's going to take you to pick
up Sam and you're going to go out.
I said, oh, that's really great.
Because I'm figuring, wow,this will be the first birthday present
I ever got in my life.

(12:01):
So we go to pick up SamGiancana in Oak park, which is a
nearby suburb.
And we drive to Cicero,Illinois, a little bit farther suburb,
but close.
And we parking behind the bankin the bank parking lot.
Now, in those days they didnot have branch banking, okay?
So the banks closed at 4o'clock Friday.

(12:23):
They stayed open till 6pmSaturday, they would stay open till
1pm so I'm sitting, you know,I'm sitting in the back and Sam Gene
Khan is sitting in the front.
And he takes out from theglove compartment a gun with a silencer
who's a.22 caliber with a silencer.
And he puts it, the silencer on.
He tells Chuck English, revthe engine.

(12:44):
Rev the engine.
Because a silencer does notcompletely Silence.
The noise.
There's always going to besome noise.
So he wanted to eliminate asmuch as possible.
The banker's coming out, andSam Giancana gets out and puts three
in the hat.
Now, three in the hat meantthree in the back of the head, okay?

(13:05):
And the banker falls down andSam Giancon puts the banker's hat
on his chest and gets back inthe car.
And Chucky English, he slowsthe engine down.
And Sam Giancana says toChucky, this is what happens when
I get bad financial advice.
This was not a mob murder, hadnothing to do with mob activities.

(13:26):
This is because Sam Giancanawas the type of guy you didn't give
bad advice.
You didn't give him any adviceunless he asked you, okay?
Like I said, when describingSam Giancana, it was a violent mind
and a violent body.
So then he takes the gunapart, takes the silencer off, and
he turns around and says,here, Scott, get rid of it.
And Chuckie English said, areyou sure you really want to do this?

(13:50):
And Sam says, he's got to learn.
So I put it in my coat.
It was in March of 1957, rightbefore Sam Giancana took over day
to day operations.
And I put in my coat and I.
They take me back home and SamGiancana says, happy birthday.
And I come.
I go home, walk upstairs.

(14:10):
I'm trying to figure out whatdo I do with this.
I never seen a silencer.
I didn't know what a silencerwas, but I got to get rid of it.
So we had the Chicago DailyNews newspaper, and I figured I'll
just wrap it up the nextmorning and, you know, put tape on
it.
And the next morning there wasa business not far who had a dumpster
maybe four blocks from the house.
Figure I'll just throw it inthe dumpster.

(14:31):
So I get up about 5:00 in the morning.
That's a school day.
And I take the gun and I goout and I get rid of it.
And I come back to the houseand I was a responsible kid.
So they always gave me a key.
I was like the first originallatch key I had around my neck.
My father says, don't lose it,otherwise you won't get another one
until you're 47 years old,maybe then.

(14:53):
So I come back home and theyput the key in the door.
Door opens up and there's myfather standing there and.
And.
And he said, how did you likeSam's birthday gift?
And I said, well, he nevertold me about It I didn't know what
to do.
And he said, remember when Itold you that you're going to see
everything and if you want togo into mob life, you're going to

(15:16):
have to see everything?
This is what you're going to see.
In other words, murders arewhat you're going to see.
So that was, you know, like Isay, that was the first one.
And then he started sending meout with juice collectors.
These were guys who collectedgambling money, loan sharking money,
and the street enforcers whocollected street tax.

(15:36):
Now what the public doesn'tknow is the reason these guys are
so aggressive is they get 50%.
Whatever they bring in, theyget half of it, okay?
So that's why they were alwaysvery aggressive.
Not only just using baseball bats.
I saw people beat with policebatons, two by fours, bicycle chains,

(15:57):
blackjacks, small handblackjacks, pipes, brass knuckles,
you know, a golf club.
I saw a guy beaten with.
And that's why they were very aggressive.
It's like, you know, thepublic will hear the term a contract
guy's contract on somebody.
And the reality is, unlessthere's a number put on someone's

(16:18):
head that's part of their job,they don't get paid any extra.
That's part of the job.
You know, that, that's like ajob responsibility.
Unless there's a number put onsomebody's head.
Like what happened with JohnnyCarson, for example, the talk show
host.
Yeah, I know all about that.
So, you know, like I say, itwas difficult at that point.
Then I'm seeing my first realphysical damage to a guy when his

(16:42):
hands were cut off because heowed juice money and he wasn't dead
yet.
At that point, he was still alive.
And he's screaming in pain.
The blood is flying all over.
They got plastic on the floor.
Eventually he dies.
And I'm getting this like kindof nauseous feeling because, you
know, I'm 11 years old, butI'm seeing a lot of violence.

(17:02):
And when I was 12, same guywho cut off the guy's hands decapitated
a guy again because he notonly did he owe money, but they thought
he was talking to the G.
The G being government.
So he was going to have to go.
And that was kind of hard.
You know, not only theviolence was hard, but a lot.
Just learning mob speak was hard.

(17:23):
Okay, that was difficultbecause of what they're talking.
I couldn't talk like that tomy classmates or kids in the school.
I, you know, I just couldn'tdo that.
It wasn't going to work.
For example, everyone watchesa movie or a mob show and they heard
the term, whack him.
He got whacked, which is aterm for someone being killed.

(17:43):
But there's another term thatI jokingly use this.
But I would say for yourselfand your listeners, if you go into
a store and a clerk says,would you like your receipt?
Make sure you run as quicklythat your comfortable shoes are tied
tight, you run out the door.
Because when you say, do youwant your receipt?
Or give them your receipt,that's another way of saying, kill

(18:04):
them.
That's another way of sayingkill him.
When you.
When a guy got made, it wouldbe opening up the books or straighten
them out.
That'd be terminology for maid.
As far as, like, say, forexample, black women, they were known
as Chocolate or Midnight.
And a couple of these guys,maybe more, maybe three guys, I can
remember their side girls wereblack women.

(18:26):
But, you know, like I say,just learning the mob speak was difficult
because then I have to go backin the neighborhood, go to school
and.
And try and say to myself,don't use that.
Don't say that.
Because, you know, peoplearen't going to know.
Say, what are you talking about?
Crazy or something, you know.
So I was going back and forthwith language.
So you've seen all sides ofmob life at a young age.

(18:47):
So as you're coming up inthis, I'm sure you've seen the good
sides, too, the lucrativesides of that.
The money, the women, the cars.
Was your mind starting to goin the mindset that you may want
to do this, or were youthinking more of not maybe not doing
it?
Well, it was a very strong temptation.
Okay, And I'll give you anexample of, you know, how it could

(19:07):
be using Henry Hill as an example.
He lived across the streetfrom Paul Vario.
I knew Paul Vario.
I knew Henry Hill.
And it would be just like ifyou think about a kid who lives across
the street from a drug dealerand sees all the clothes, the nice
car, the girls, everythinglooks nice.
And they're saying tothemselves, gee, I don't want to
work at McDonald's for $15 an hour.

(19:29):
I want to go into this type oflife that I can have the money and
do all these things.
That was same thing with Henry Hill.
He was, what I would say, amob groupie.
He saw what was going on whenhe was a young man, and he'd go into
it.
So the temptations are verygreat because you have to remember
it's not only the Money, it'sthe power.
You know, like my father wouldalways say, there's always two ways

(19:50):
to manipulate somebody throughmoney and through fear.
Okay?
And that would be like, say,for example, you wanted to see, say,
the Temptations or somesinging group, but you couldn't get
tickets.
Well, somebody would make thecall to the promoter and you get
tickets.
You'd be maybe in the secondor third row, and you go backstage

(20:11):
after the show is over, andmaybe someone like David Ruffin,
you would meet him, you wouldtalk to him, maybe take pictures.
But that happened because youwere not connected.
You were mob connected.
So the.
The advantages you had werevery simple.
You know, you go into arestaurant and the restaurant owner,
which a street tax on arestaurant was 2%, bars were 3%,

(20:36):
and they want to give you afree meal.
They want to give you a free meal.
Okay.
My father would never take it,but they.
All other guys, sure, yeah, yeah.
Give me a free meal.
They want it free.
Because if you give wise guysfree stuff, they're your best friend.
They'll do anything for you.
Give them a free pencil andthey'll like you.
So, you know, it didn't matter.
So, yeah, it was difficultbecause you're single.

(20:57):
How easy this was, how womenwould retract to.
Even when I go out now with inperson presentations of my book inside,
I always allow for a questionand answer statement period after
the presentation.
I can't tell you how manywomen will always say, you know,
this life is fascinating.
I like this life.
You know, I'd like to knowmore about this life.

(21:18):
You can see it in their facethat, yeah, they like to be associated
with someone who's in moblife, just like girls who, like,
maybe bikers in the biker gang.
Same thing.
So, yeah, it was veryattractive, you know, and at a young
age, you're seeing all thisand you're saying to yourself, wow,
this is really.
Could be something, man.
I could be part of something big.

(21:38):
And it was.
It was true.
It was true.
So it was difficult.
Now, during this time, you gotto meet one of the most iconic, who
is considered to be one of themost beautiful women in the world,
Marilyn Monroe.
What did you say to her whenyou met her?
Well, first thing I said toher, you know, my grandfather, because
my grandfather was thephotographer who took her photograph.

(22:00):
This was for the COVID forHugh Hefner's Playboy magazine, I
think, in July of 1953.
And that was the first thing I said.
And she says, oh, yourgrandfather was tough.
And the reason she's sayingthat is because she was supposed
to come 7:30 in the morning.
My grandfather, who's aportrait photographer and the reason
Hugh Hefner wanted to usethem, he'd heard about them, was

(22:23):
by hand.
They didn't have airbrushes inthose days, but by hand my grandfather
could put in the textures ofthe skin, the color textures.
And if you look at that coverand it's online, you will see that
everything looks normal.
Her thighs, her face,everything looks normal.
Because my grandfather, byhand, with a brush, would be able
to put in the skin tones andthe negatives.

(22:45):
But did Marilyn Monroe show upat 7:30?
No, she did not.
She came about 12:30 and at 1:00.
My grandfather had a youngcouple who was getting married and
want to take pictures beforetheir wedding.
So she says to him, I'm here.
And she was there with her people.
Her road manager, mygrandfather says, you had a 7:30
appointment.
You were supposed to come at 7:30.

(23:06):
I'm not going to use otherpeople's time for you.
You were late.
Get out.
Go.
So she didn't, she, I guessher manager called Hugh Hefner and
he called my grandfather laterthat day.
My grandfather says, unlessshe can come on time, I don't care
who she is.
Because my grandfather did notlike that type of photography, okay?
He, he did families, he didHarry Truman and Harry Truman's family.

(23:29):
He was interested more into that.
He wasn't interested in thosedays, what you call pornography as
composed of what realpornography was, that type of stuff.
But he got paid $50, which wasa lot of money in those days, and
so he did it.
So the next day, Hugh Hefnerhad Marilyn Monroe there at 7:30
in the morning.
That's what she would tell me.
Says your grandfather wastough, but he was really, really

(23:51):
good.
And then she would start, shewould start, we would talk and I'd
say, you know, my father wouldalways say to the girls who brought
the carts with the free drinksin Las Vegas and the hotels, casinos
that do a Maryland.
Do a Maryland.
She says, what did your fathermean by do a Maryland?
Because she came in, she waswearing a wig of brown.
She was a brunette with this wig.

(24:11):
And I said, well, he wouldalways say that if you dye your hair
blonde, you will see, yourtips will double and triple.
Because men are attracted to blondes.
That catches their eye right away.
They might like brunettes orblack haired or redheads, but when
they see a blonde, yeah,they're real.
Their eyes just focus on themand they'll do.

(24:32):
You know, you'll be able tomanipulate them.
Can manipulate them to getsome extra money.
And sure enough, these girlswould do that, and their tips double,
tripled, quadrupled.
Okay.
So she took off her wig, andher hair was blonde.
She said, you mean like this?
And I said, yes.
So she told me, well, you'rekind of right, because everyone talks

(24:52):
about my blonde hair.
So, you know, we went.
We went from there.
She had a very difficult life.
Her mother was a diagnosedschizophrenic, was in and out of
institutions and asylums.
And when she was born, theDCFS of California said, can we take

(25:13):
her?
Because they had somebody there.
She healthy enough to go on?
The doctor said, yes, she's healthy.
And she was in.
She wind up being in 12 fosterhomes and four orphanages in her
life.
And she eventually, with thehelp of a private detective, tracked
down her real father.
Because on her birthcertificate, it says, Norm would
say Norma Jean Mortensen.

(25:35):
But that was her mother's kindof boyfriend.
He was willing to use his nameso there'd be a name, a man's name
on the birth certificate.
And she finally tracks downher father in Rhode island, your
biological father.
And he says.
And she says, you know, theyknow me as Marilyn Monroe, but I'm
your daughter, Norma Jean.
And he says, I'm married now.

(25:55):
I have a family.
Talk to my lawyer.
And he walked away from herhead, kind of bowed down.
And I realized later, when I,you know, look back at it many years
later, that's the moment whenI realized that's why she would go
after the top people, the Joe DiMaggios.
I know how things startedbetween her and the Kennedys.
In fact, I know how thingsstarted between the Kennedys and

(26:16):
the Outfit.
So I understood, because in away, she was trying to show to her
father, you know, I'm worthyof your love.
I knew.
I had that feeling.
That's what it was really allabout with her.
She always wanted the top guyto show to her father, hey, what?
You know, why did you walkaway from me?
You wouldn't talk to me.
And he.
And he didn't, because I asked her.
I said, did he speak to you at all?

(26:37):
Other Saying what you said?
And she said, no, that's allhe said.
He walked away.
And we never talked or had anycontact after that.
And she was hurt.
I could see in her face,because she starts looking down.
So, yeah, it was.
We talked for about two hours.
And then she says, how old are you?
And I says, Just a little past 13.

(26:57):
She's, yeah, 13 going on 40.
She says, what have you liveda thousand lives?
I said, maybe a thousand one.
So we had, we had a nice conversation.
She was nice to me.
And the Blackstone Hotel were.
Where we met was a mob hotelin the sense of Saturday night.
They had prostitution, mobprostitution there, as did other

(27:19):
hotels in downtown Chicago.
See, my prostitution fromdowntown Chicago and a place on north
side, place on south side thatwas bringing in a million dollars
a year.
12 million a year was comingin from prostitution.
So that was pretty big.
And I'm sure the currentowners of the Blackstone Hotel would
be very surprised to know thattheir place on Saturday night was

(27:40):
used for mob prostitution.
Wow, what a story.
Yeah, I've always read that,you know, Marilyn Monroe had a very
troubled life.
I've dug in a little bit into it.
I did read that she was oftendepressed about things that you just
discussed, but she hid it verywell, you know, when she was out
in public.
So, yeah, her life, like yousaid, was very troubled.
You know, I learned about whenI was in, going to Las Vegas, who

(28:01):
the good celebrities really were.
In other words, what were,what was their private life like
as opposed to their publiclife, and who the bad ones were.
You know, I knew.
I knew who was good, who was bad.
And that people would besurprised, you know, when I tell
them, oh, this guy, he's notreally too good, or this guy is good,
you know, they'd be surprisedbecause they see a public image of

(28:21):
someone, they think, oh,that's how they are.
Oh, that's not how they are.
That's not how they are at all.
They just put on a public face.
So in your book, you go alittle bit about this.
So let's discuss it for the audience.
So what was the Outfit really like?
You know, what was the eventsof personality, the history behind
it?
Well, it was.
The Outfit has been inbusiness for about 120 years.

(28:42):
They're still around today.
There's four street crews thatthey don't have the numbers.
At one time they had over 330guys involved.
And they were in businessbefore Al Capone was brought in by
Johnny Torio to come to Chicago.
And basically at that point,the big thing, of course, was the
black hands.
Always the black hands.

(29:03):
And the black hands, what theywere, they were Sicilians, born in
Sicily and came to America.
And as far as the mob went,they would accept maybe somebody
who was northern Italian, butnever in a leadership capacity.
Anybody else.
No, they would never accept aspart of the mob, they didn't want
them.
So of course there was alwaysconcern about them because they were

(29:25):
extortionists.
They were all over this city.
They could be very violent.
They come to your business andwant extortion money.
Telling you all theneighborhoods, there's some rough
things going on here, but youneed protection.
And if you didn't go alongwith them, say you owned a grocery
store that night, they put ablack hand on your door.
That was like telling you,okay, we're coming after you now.

(29:47):
And they would do it what myfather would always refer to as phases.
Phase one, phase two, andphase one would be break all the
windows.
Then the next day come backand, you know, same thing, trying
to get extortion money.
And if they didn't get it thatnight, they'd set the grocery store
on fire, okay?
So then if the guy came in thenext morning and saw his place in

(30:08):
rubble, they said, well, youknow, when you rebuild, we, this
is why we're telling you, see,there's problems in the neighborhood.
And if they wouldn't go longafter that.
And the guy was a target, okay?
The guy was a target.
He was never going to see asunrise again.
That was the end for him.
But as far as the outfit went,after prohibition ended there, you

(30:31):
know, they had so much moneycoming in from so many different
ways.
They had control of theHollywood unions, okay, which when
I talked to Marilyn Monroe, Iknew how she got the part in the
movie Some like it hot, 1959,they were getting street money and
street taxes, okay?

(30:51):
They had control of theunions, and that was 10%.
There was multiple unions in Chicago.
They had control of, say, theproducer industry, not only the companies
that own produce, but thetrucking industry.
And that was always one thingI'll never forget.
About a year and a half aftermy book came out, I'm giving a in

(31:12):
person presentation and I'mtelling people how, well, maybe you
don't have mob family connections.
The mob has touched your lifeat some point.
And so when that's over, a guystands up, says, Mr.
Hoffman, I, I don't, I don'tever have any mob people in my family.
I don't know anybody.
There's nobody on my block.
So how can you say that themob has touched my life?

(31:36):
And sitting next to thegentleman he was standing at the
time she's sitting was anelderly woman, white haired, a grandmother
looking type.
And she gives him, gives him acouple light taps on the arm, very
light.
And he turns and she SaidJimmy Hoffa, Teamsters.
And he sat down.
He understood, because theTeamsters union, when, you know,

(31:57):
especially when Jimmy Hoffatook over, who my father knew had
given money to Jimmy Hoffawhen he ran for his first local office,
like secretary, treasurer ofhis local, they could shut a city
down.
In other words, the teamsterdrivers, the truck drivers wouldn't
deliver food, they wouldn'tdeliver medicine.
They'd be off that day.
They wouldn't deliver, youknow, like construction stuff that

(32:19):
was needed.
The same thing worked if youwere building a commercial property
and you were not paying fast.
You know, things were.
There things going on.
The labor union guys wouldn'tshow up.
The heavy equipment guyswouldn't show up.
That is why when Mayor Richard J.
Daly was mayor, Bill Lee washead of afl, CIO and every political

(32:41):
function.
Bill Lee and his wife weresitting at the dais right next to
Richard Jay Daly and his wife,because Daly always wanted to make
sure.
Don't get the unions upset,make sure everything is smooth.
City workers who weretradespeople, they got prevailing
wage, even though they weren'tin the union yet, they got prevailing

(33:03):
wage.
So, yeah, there was so manyways of bringing in the money that
was coming in.
My father, when Tony Carrolltook over 1943, he said, let's expand
the business.
So that's when mob people fromMinneapolis, from Des Moines, from
Milwaukee, from St.
Louis, from Omaha, Nebraska,and in 1957, Los Angeles, all reported

(33:28):
to the outfit, paying at least30% of their revenues to the outfit.
And it was kind of interestingbecause when I was working in that
Lucchese crime families, therestaurant was called the Suite,
was owned by Henry Hill.
That's where I met the realTommy, Tommy Disimone, who was very,
very psychotic.
And right off the bat, he's,you know, he's talking to me, he

(33:48):
says about mob life, about this.
And, you know, he's not realfriendly to me.
And, you know, I'm a collegestudent at Long Island University.
And I said to him, you got acouple of uncles working for Los
Angeles mob, don't you?
He says, yeah, how do you know him?
I says, why don't you call upyour father, your uncle, and just

(34:09):
tell him that you met a guywhose father was high ranking in
the outfit.
See what he tells you, okay?
So he says, can I use.
I'll use your name.
He said.
I said, absolutely.
Use my name.
Come on.
The son.
So the next time I'm back inat the restaurant a couple days later,
Tommy Disimoni comes Up tomeets us.
My uncle said, whatever theguy from the Outfit wants, you do.

(34:32):
Don't start with them.
Don't start with them.
Because everyone knew the Outfit.
Once they got control ofsomething, they didn't play around
with anybody.
Las Vegas and Florida wasalways open.
Any mob family could do theirenterprise in those in those states.
Those were open.
And my father's approach wasbuild hotels as quickly as possible.

(34:54):
And we're going to get thefoothold in Las Vegas.
And mob families would alwaysknow one thing.
Vegas belonged to the Outfit.
And it really did.
It really did.
So they took over Las Vegas.
How did the mob influencestudios in Hollywood and beyond that?
Because they had control ofthe unions.
When the union started in the1930s, the outfit ran a slate.

(35:19):
My father was young.
He was in his twenties then.
He was a manager for Paul Rico.
Okay, at that point, becauseRico was taking over.
Because if you ever want agood trivia question to catch someone,
stump them.
Say, who was convicted.
With Al Capone, it was Frank nitty.
He got 18 months.
Al Capone got 11 years.
And Paul.

(35:40):
Paul Rico was an underboss, okay?
Which is on the same level asa consigliere, if you were to look
on an organization chart.
And he was running theoperation while, you know, Frank
Nitty, who my father calledNutty Nitty, was away.
And my father said to me,says, you know, they're starting
these unions in Hollywood.

(36:02):
Let's get a foothold in there.
Let's control them.
So Paul Rica says, well, how?
What are we going to do?
And my father said, look,we'll run a slate of our own.
Slate in the unions when theyhave the elections, and we'll get
control.
And that's what happened.
They got control so they coulddictate who got parts.
Let us say, who would advance.

(36:23):
Yeah, they controlled it.
And, you know, that's what the1943, what they called it, the Hollywood
Case, was about.
Because they were shaking downJack Warner, who owned Warner Productions.
And the reason they're doingthis is because they want to control
who gets the parts in the movies.
And also who.

(36:44):
Who would be involved in the movies.
In other words, they wouldtake someone say, well, you make
this one a person, a star.
You do this, you do that,they'd have control.
And of course, the, say, thepeople that work behind the scenes,
the grips and all these otherpeople who do setups of, you know,
the operation of, like, say, ahotel room using a hotel room, they

(37:05):
bring in the furniture andthat type of thing.
They were all Unionized.
If they didn't show up forwork, that meant your movie couldn't
get made.
And these guys like JackWarner and David golden and Golden
Mayer, they had taken out bankloans, they had money on the street
and now they're going to haveto pay interest on a loan and they

(37:26):
can't even get the movie done.
So, yeah, the control is very,very tight.
Very, very tight because of that.
So as we know, John Gotti hadgot the name Teflon Don because they
said nothing ever stuck to himuntil it did.
So, you know, as you know, hewent to jail for life.
He died in prison.

(37:46):
But your father was in the mobover 55 years and he never served
a day in jail.
How did he do that?
Yeah, first of all, because atrestaurants he wouldn't say a word
because he was always concerned.
Under the table was a bug thatsomebody was listening to the conversation.
So he would sit there withother mobsters, but he wouldn't really

(38:06):
talk.
But my father used churches,okay, Catholic churches, used Jewish
synagogues.
He used Catholic cemeteries,Jewish cemeteries he work in like
the park district, all thepark districts had field houses.
He would meet with people andtalk with people in areas that, to

(38:27):
be honest with you, the FBIdidn't know this was going on.
And say, for example, in aCatholic church, they would allow
him to use the phone, okay?
And there was at least fivechurches that in the church basement
was a very long freezer.
Not high, tall, but wide.
And that would be if a guygot, was given his receipt that night.

(38:50):
The body would be taken to thechurch or put it in a body bag, put
in the freezer.
And the next morning guyswould come to the church and take
it out of the freezer.
So of course, the priestsnever let anybody go downstairs.
They don't want anyone to knowwhat was going on.
And my father would say, givethe priest five dollar donation.
You know when he'd use church.

(39:11):
Or else if the priest was adrinker, that's when he'd get him,
say, Johnny Walker Red orDwyer's or Jack Daniels.
And so he would use placesthat were not thought of as places
like restaurants, bars, toavoid anything that the gnos of government

(39:31):
would have any feeling.
Well, we got to put a bug in there.
We got to do this, we got todo this, that electronically.
And when I met with, inOctober of 2016 at a restaurant with
22 retired FBI agents in it,I, a wife of one of them called me
and I said, look, if they signmy book, I will come and Give me
a free lunch.
I'll come and speak to them.
And I did.

(39:51):
They came with their wives,and practically all the agents would
stand up and say, your fathernever fit the mold of wise guys.
That's why we had a hard time,because my father sometimes would
tell a young agent, you know,it's very nice to meet you, but I'll
be around after you retire.
And when an agent wouldretire, my father would send a retirement
card and say, thank you so much.

(40:13):
Nice meeting you.
Enjoy your retirement.
I'm still here.
So it was hard for them to geta handle on him.
What he could do, what he wasdoing, where he was doing it.
And because of the money hewas bringing from Las Vegas, the
people like, you know, PaulRica, Tony Accardo, Sam Giancana,
Joey Iupa, the guys hereported to on top, let's say the

(40:35):
upper management, they gave myfather a lot of leeway, and a lot
of guys resented that.
It was a lot of, you know,hatred against my father.
So a lot of times I'd be withmy father, and he'd have a.32 on
a holster, okay, expecting me.
If there's going to be aproblem, I'm going to hit them first
before they hit me.
Because these guys, like Isay, they didn't like my father,

(40:55):
especially when he met SamGiancana, how that occurred.
So.
But he was bringing in the money.
He had good plans.
He had a good drug plan thatthey didn't listen to, and they apologized
later.
And the drug plan, like he'dalways tell me, he knew about what
Mayor Lansky was doing inHavana after World War II, when Batista
was in power before Castro,which in Havana was really like a
mini Las Vegas.

(41:16):
And he'd always say to me, thebest plans are the ones you steal
from somebody else.
And at that time, the reasonhe was going to use women as mules
in the drug trafficking,because Virginia Hill, who was Bugsy
Siegel's girlfriend, who setup the murder, she was bringing back
heroin from Mexico to the outfits.

(41:37):
Tony Accardo.
So my father just expanded,you know, the plan.
But they, you know, maybeit'll work, maybe it wouldn't.
It was like Las Vegas when hemet with Paul Rica and Sam Giancana,
Antonio Cardo presented his plan.
Paul Rica, who his.
He would always say, make itgo away.
Make it go away.

(41:57):
If there was a problem, if youwant someone killed, make it go away.
He just sat there.
Sam Gene kind of says, well, I don't.
We'll have to see.
Tony is A flash in the pan.
Las Vegas is never going to work.
How are you going to make it work?
We're going to not make any money.
It's.
It's just not.
It's that flash in the pan andthen it could be gone.
And my father would say, tony,this is how we'll make money.
We're going to take all theillegal money from Chicago.

(42:18):
The gambling money, theextortion money, you know, any.
Any illegal money that theAlfred was bringing in and take it
to Las Vegas, buy chips, cashthe chips in, and bring the dirty
money back clean.
When Tony Accardo heard that,he said, do the plan.
You got the order.
Do the plan.
So that's how that started.

(42:40):
So, yeah, that's why theoutfit in mob life, when you mentioned
Chicago, even today, whilethey don't have a representative
physically from Chicago, theGenovese family represents Chicago
today on the mob commission.
Though the mob commission isnot like it was.
You know, they'll havecaptains and under bosses meet.

(43:00):
They don't have actual guys meet.
But there still is a mobcommission and Chicago is represented.
And they haven't had anybody there.
Oh, I guess, I don't know,maybe 30 years or more.
Maybe even more than that.
But they've always beenrepresentative because everyone knew
with the Outfit, you don'trile them up.
You don't start with thembecause they could put more guns

(43:20):
on.
That's what my father said.
The reason they leave us aloneand don't try and take over our business
operations in Las Vegas oranyplace else is that we can put
more guns on the street thanthey can.
You always say, scott,remember this.
If a guy could put more gunson the street than you, don't start
with them, because you're notgoing to win that war.
Wow.

(43:41):
So I've been told that youhave insights on the Kennedy assassination
and other controversial eventsand historical figures.
Do you think that the Kennedyassassination had anything to do
with mob?
Oh, yes.
Absolutely.
Absolutely it did, because itwas all about Cal Neva.
Cal Neva was a casino on theborder of California, Nevada.

(44:03):
It was actually a skiing resort.
Okay.
They would get maybe close to200 inches, sometimes more of snow
and everything.
And Joseph P.
Kennedy, the father, knew theowner at that time, and he used to
take the children out therefor skiing.
So John and Robert Kennedy,who hated to be called Bobby, I'll
tell you that he hated that.

(44:24):
He said, I'm not a kid.
He'd always introduced himselfas Bob Kennedy, okay?
Phony, big phony.
And they knew about Cal Neva.
They knew about it.
And it's a long, long story ofhow it started between them.
But everything started from Caleb.
And I'll tell you this.
Once John Kennedy becamepresident and Robert Kennedy became

(44:46):
Attorney General, nothing wasdone that was agreed upon.
It was like the, we didn't exist.
Thank you for helping us get elected.
Because they, they wanted,they wanted Sam Giancana and his
friends, meaning union people,to support him in the 1960 election.
And it's a very, very long story.
You would, you would need acouple years to get the whole story.

(45:09):
But it started that way and itwent bad that way because Robert
Kennedy right away wasdeveloping strike forces to go after
the mob.
We're going to break them, hewould say, we're going to break them.
But when, when the mob, whenthey needed the mob to help John
Kennedy get elected.
Oh, yeah, we'll do this, we'lldo that, we'll, we'll make the two

(45:30):
lane highway in near Calnevainto a six lane highway.
Oh, yeah, the airport, which,the airport was in South Lake Tahoe,
was big enough maybe just forcorporate jets.
It couldn't take generalplanes landing there.
The runways weren't big enough.
If you had a corporate jet,you could land there.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Robert Kennedy said, yeah,yeah, we're going to, we're going

(45:52):
to build a regular airport.
Put in the, the, the correctlanes, the size.
Yeah, you'll be able to bringin, you know, regular airplanes like
you could bring in in anymajor city, any airport, you know,
today.
No.
Did any of that take place?
No.
So that it got real, real vicious.
Especially with Frank Sinatra,who put in for the license and it

(46:14):
takes a year because youneeded a legit guy.
That's why when my fatherbuilt the seven hotels, seven casinos,
it's not like the movieCasino, not at all.
Not even close to what reallyhappened because he needed regular
business people to get the license.
But he would always tell him,he'd always say, you bring in hotel
people because they were goingto run the hotel and the outfit was

(46:36):
the consultants for the casino.
That's a long story.
But yeah, that's where MarilynMonroe got involved.
That's another story of howshe got involved.
Shirley McLean was there.
Yeah, that's a long story.
But it went bad, Went badbecause of Robert Kennedy.
So it's often been said foryears that everybody's felt like

(46:56):
Lee Harvey Oswald did notactually commit the murder, but he
was the fall guy.
Do you agree with that?
Well, I'm not Saying he was.
He was the fall guy.
It's a very possibility.
What I'll tell you is this,the initial report by the FBI, they
said that was the firstinitial ballistics report.
And all the documents havebeen, you know, like, frozen.

(47:18):
Okay.
They're not.
The public can't see them.
There's no way.
Donald Trump said, yeah, hewas going to open it up.
He never did that.
So no one has ever seen thefinal ballistic report.
But the FBI at that time said,we have all the bullets from Lee
Harvey Oswald's rifle.
Now, if there was a secondshooter, which a lot of people claim,
oh, there was a second shooter.

(47:39):
Where are the bullets?
Okay.
Because they didn't know thatLee, that the rifle Lee Harvey Oswald
had, what type of rifle itwas, and that Jack Ruby, who had
lived in the neighborhood andleft Chicago in 1949, knew my father.
My father got him a job on,say, South State street, which is
in downtown Chicago, near thesouth end of the Loop, as downtown

(48:01):
is called because of the train.
The elevated train runs aroundthe Loop, so it's referred, you know,
downtown's refer to some loop.
It got him his first job with,you know, a strip club that was run
by a guy who was close to TonyAccardo, a guy named High Shout Levin,
whose voice was very booming,like a, you know, Rush Limbaugh type

(48:21):
of voice.
And so, yeah, he knew and hecalled my father, but my father didn't
know why he wanted a riflewith a scope.
He never told him.
He says, just, he said, Ican't buy it in Dallas because that's
the first place if somethinggoes wrong, they'll be checking.
But he didn't say what he wasgoing to do with it.
So my father went down toKlein Sporting Goods store in downtown
Chicago.

(48:41):
It cost $12.99.
He paid cash, and he gave theJack Ruby's address and was mailed
right to Ruby.
So when the FBI was able totrack down where the gun was bought
and they went to Chicago,Klein's, you know, sporting goods
store, no one could rememberwho came in because the receipt just
showed the address.
Yeah.
So there's, you know, I'm notsaying there wasn't a second shooter,

(49:05):
but where's the proof?
I mean, Kennedy had problemswith the CIA, had a lot of problems
with a lot of people.
But where is the proof ofwhere is the second bullet?
Okay.
And like I said, withoutseeing a final ballistics report,
initial claim was, well, wehave all the bullets from this rifle.
So there's, you know, like Isaid, I'm not saying that Har.
Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't justa patsy, let us say, okay, fall guy,

(49:30):
because he belonged to thatright wing organization that Jack
Ruby was running out of Dallas.
But I'm not saying that eitherbecause there was so many enemies
that Kennedy had at that pointthat there might have been other
influences at the time.
So what made you decide in theend overall not to go into the life?
Happened in my senior year ofhigh school.

(49:53):
I decided that what I hadseen, which I was a hardened veteran
by 17 years old, okay?
And I said to myself, that'snot really what I want to do with
my life.
So I talked to my mother and Isaid, you know, dad and I, we've
never talked about if I'mgoing to go into life or not.
And I had gotten theapplication for a junior college

(50:13):
in Chicago.
And in those days juniorcolleges was tuition free.
You had to pay for your books,but the tuitions were actually free.
And I said to her, I'm goingto further my education.
I want to go to a juniorcollege because I don't know what
I really want to do.
So why would I want to wastemoney going to a four year school
if I chose something I didn't like?
So I said, I'll go, you know,at least a couple years, try and

(50:33):
get an associate's degree andsee what I might be interested to
pursue.
I said, but I don't know howdad's going to take it or is he going
to like it.
What is he going to say?
My mother said, just tell him,just tell him.
So he came home.
My father used to workstraight jobs.
He did not work any mobrelated jobs, any, no show jobs,
any government type of jobs, everything.
And the reason that wasbecause he wanted to get a W2 and

(50:58):
show legit income, okay?
Because he knew he was auditedby the IRS criminal division.
But there was nothing theycould see other than a W2 and maybe
a little interest on a bankaccount with his.
My mother's name was on theaccount, not his.
So there wasn't anything theycould pin him on because his lawyer,
his criminal lawyer was agentleman by the name of Julius Lucius

(51:18):
Eccles, kind of a well knowncriminal defense lawyer in Chicago.
And he would always say, and Imentioned this in the book and I,
I associated with a fictitiousname of Ira, an accountant.
But Mr.
Echols would always say, payyour taxes.
He said, I, if a human beingis on the stand, I can take apart
their story, I can pick it apart.

(51:41):
But he said, a document Ican't cross examine.
And I think that always playedmy father's mind.
That's why he worked regular jobs.
But when the FBI would come totalk to him, he got fired the same
day.
Okay, so it was very difficult.
And my mother had to go backto work because we had.
We were getting kicked out ofplaces and we didn't have.
Couldn't pay the rent.
And it was, you know, very,very difficult.

(52:02):
So when I went to.
So I talked with my father, Isaid, dad, look, I'm not going to
go into life as a participant.
I'll just stay as an observer.
I want to go to junior college.
I named the junior college wasWilbur Wright Junior College, which
is still in existence.
And he looked at me, said,scott, look, the worst thing a parent
can do is to force their kid,whether Matt, girl or boy, into something

(52:25):
they don't want to do becausethe kid's going to come back 30 years
later and said, you forced meinto this.
You forced me into it.
If you want to continue youreducation and go into some field,
I'm 150% behind you, you goahead, make it happen.
But he says, by you not beingin the life, that doesn't bother
me.
And he would say, remember,what did I tell you?

(52:48):
You're going to see everythingand then make your own decision.
This is your decision.
I support it.
And that's.
That's how it started.
That's how I didn't go in.
Well, no matter how anybodyfeels about the mob or maybe what
your dad have done, I willcommend him for that.
I have followed some other mobchildren, and it seems like that

(53:09):
they felt like they had to gothat direction because of who their
father was.
So I do commend your fatherfor not forcing you to go into the
life.
Do you ever regret not going in?
Are you still happy that you didn't?
No, no.
See, the difference betweenmyself and other mock children is
they would ask me, is myfather in the Mafia or something?

(53:30):
My father would always tellhim, talk to your father.
The thing was, they never saw it.
It was never talked aboutuntil much later on in their life.
You know, late teens ought tosay, or if the FBI came to talk to
them.
But they never knew what moblife was.
They only knew it from maybeif they saw a movie or something.
They had no idea I knew whatmob life was about.

(53:51):
Okay?
So that was, you know, thatwas quite a big difference for these.
And I felt for the kidsbecause they didn't know what they
were getting into.
They might thought, oh, it'sgoing to be like a television show
or a movie.
No, it's not like that at all.
But I was way past thatalready up, you know, way, way past
it.
So it was difficult for them.
And they would ask me about itand I say, well, talk to your father

(54:11):
or talk to your uncle who'sever in the life.
Because they didn't talk aboutit at all.
And they were being told, yourdad's away at college or he's got
an out of town job, you know,so it was.
It was hard for them.
But no, it was.
It wasn't hard at all reallyto make that decision because, see,
I always knew what theconsequences were.

(54:31):
I knew what the bad was.
My father would always say,you're going to meet more good people
in your life than bad people,but you have to know what the bad
people are.
And he said, the day they takedown Cook County Jail, then you'll
know everybody's good.
That's not going to happen.
But his whole approach was, Iwant you to do it on your own and

(54:52):
not come back to me 30 yearslater and said, you forced me as
what happened, like you saywith other kids.
I knew that then all of asudden, they're getting arrested,
they're getting sentenced,they're going away.
They're not going to be withtheir wife and kids.
Yeah.
And the problem is, since theydidn't know, they didn't have any
skills when they got out ofprison, over 90% of them, maybe higher,

(55:13):
they went back to the life.
They were back to the lifebecause they couldn't do anything.
And so I knew getting acollege education would definitely
help me in my life.
And I studied journalism and,you know, that's what I really wanted
to do.
Be a writer at that point.
Regretting it?
No, because I know whathappens now.
There is a lot of books and alot of movies that have been written

(55:35):
and produced about the mob life.
What do the best books andmovies get wrong about the life?
Well, they make it look kindof like it's glamorous.
Okay.
Like, you know, or else it'sseen from a different perspective.
Everyone's getting killed oreveryone's getting beat, but they
don't talk about really whathappens, what things happen.

(55:56):
For example, in my bookInside, one of the things I had to
do, as you read the book, is,was when I was 12 years old, I'm
with a juice collector andwe're going to some guy's house.
He wasn't There, but his wifewas there, and she was pregnant,
very obviously pregnant.
What physically reallyhappened to her?
Because if I really put downwhat really physically happened to
her, it would probably make alot of people nauseous, okay?

(56:20):
So I.
I didn't put that in.
I know a lot of people are petowners, okay?
They own dogs, cats, you know,So I didn't put in what I saw done
to dogs, okay?
The viciousness done to dogs.
I mean, these were guys, youknow, they owe money, and.
And wise guys would say, well,we're going to force them.
And they see the dog in thebackyard, and they come back with

(56:42):
some meat, put rat poison inother poison, and.
And so dog would eat it, andthen he would die.
And then they would come in,you know, at that time or at a later
time, they would use atranquilizing gun on a dog.
So he'd go to sleep, and thenthey come in with an ax and start
chopping the dog up in pieces.

(57:02):
So I'm not going to put thatin the book because it would get
people, again, probably very nauseous.
What was happening to a dog?
It was just a dog, okay?
The dog wasn't in the life,but yet his owner happened to be
a gambler or was involved.
So, yeah, there was a lot ofthings in, you know, and it's mainly
because a lot of people, they.
They don't know people are the screenwriters.

(57:24):
Like the movie the Irishman.
I was supposed to talk aboutthat, and that's when COVID 19, hit
at a restaurant.
I was supposed to speak about it.
Yeah, that's not how it really was.
Okay?
But they would see it as that,and they would think, oh, this is
how it is.
Because people like MartinScorsese, not, he's done great work
and everything, but he doesn'treally know things from the inside.

(57:44):
He doesn't know.
He's only hearing it fromsomebody and whether that someone
is just building themselves upto sound good.
You know, some people like torun their mouth, but like my father
would say, sometimes withpeople what they know, you could
put it in a thimble and have room.
And he would always tell me,with wise guys, always remember this,
90% is lies, 10% is BS.

(58:08):
So you check everything out.
He said, in fact, you checkout, if mom says she loves you, you
check it out.
And I would say, if my mothersays she loves me, I can't accept
it.
No, you check it out.
You always check outeverything with guys, because guys
are going to lie.
And that's what Happens whenyou see guys are technical advisors
on movies, they're not tellingthe straight truth.

(58:29):
They're telling stuff to makethemselves look good, make it look
more glamorous.
Yeah, that's, that's what'sgoing on.
Very few movies, very fewbooks are really legitimate.
And the, and the reason insideis different from all these books
because hosts asked me isbecause you're seeing it through
the eyes of an eight year old chops.
Eight year old child.

(58:50):
You're seeing a child talkabout it.
You're not seeing some 35, 45,50 year old guy who's been in the
life, you know, decadestalking now about mob life.
You're seeing it through a child.
That's something that wasbasically unheard of, you know, in
mob life.
It was all because of the LasVegas money.
I knew it that you know,that's what it was all about.

(59:11):
So no, they really now don'tget it right too much at all.
But people don't know, justlike your work, they don't know the
inner workings of what you dohere on the show.
And they might think, oh,everything is great.
Well, you have some gueststhat are very good and then you have
some guests that you say toyourself, boy, what a, what a bad
evening.
How am I going to get thisreally out?

(59:32):
He was, didn't say a word.
He just sat there, you know.
Yeah, but people don'tunderstand it because they're not
living it.
You're living your job.
You know, what, what it's about.
And if somebody tried to tellmake a movie of you and your job
and you say wait a minute,that's not how it is, that's not
how it works.
Okay.
That's not how the show is puttogether, how we get in contact with

(59:55):
guests and how we work.
No, that's not right.
So that's why.
But the movies, you alwayshave to remember to trying to make
it for entertainment so peoplewill come out and see.
I remember taking my fatherand mother 1972 for the Godfather
and that's another story withFrank Sinatra, why he, he told Mario
Puzo, you know, the author ofthe books the Godfather to choke

(01:00:17):
on.
That's another's another longstory why that occurred.
But when I got got out of themovie, I said, I said dad, what you
think?
And he says it was a movie, itwas a movie.
That's all he said.
It's all he said about it.
It was a movie.
Well, I'll tell you guys is listening.
Inside is an incredible book.
There's A lot of detail in there.
Scott holds nothing back.

(01:00:37):
He goes all in.
We're going to tell you howyou can get that.
But everything we've talkedabout here today, and then some,
is in this incredible book.
I have to ask you, though, nowthat you've written this book, you've
said that the outfit stilloperates in some level.
Have you had any blowback fromanyone in the outfit or anybody else
that's currently in the mobfrom writing this book?

(01:00:57):
No.
No.
And there's maybe a couple.
Some.
Couple reasons.
Maybe a third reason.
First of all, I don't have anyinvolvement with them.
They want to talk to me, youknow, through the mob grapevine.
Just like your business, youhave a grapevine.
You might hear about thishost, that host.
There's mob grapevine.
And people are always gettingin touch with me.

(01:01:17):
Not wise guys, but people whomaybe know somebody.
They'll ask me a questionabout something.
And the reason these guys wantto talk with me is I know things
about them that go beyond thestatute of limitation.
So I think you're anintelligent man, a very smart man.
I think you can understandwhat I'm talking about.
Absolutely.
So they want to be friendlywith me to keep on the good side
that I'm not going to rat them out.

(01:01:38):
I wouldn't rat anybody out,you know, but they want to stay on
the good side.
And then I said the otherreasons possibly why there'd be no
blowback on it is either thefew guys that are in prison or the
other guys are either dead orthey can't read.
So I'm not worried about that.
Tell us where we can get yourincredible book.

(01:02:00):
I've read the reviews on thisbook before I read it.
You've got everybody comingout praising this book if it's not
already.
It should be, I'm sure anumber one bestseller.
Want to tell the audiencewhere we can get a hold of your book
and get a hold of you?
Okay.
My book is being sold on Amazon.
If you put in my first name,Scott S, C O T, T, middle initial

(01:02:22):
M.
You have to put that inbecause there's other Scott Hoffman's
who are writers.
And then my last name,Hoffman, H O F, F, M A N.
And the title.
Inside you will see the book.
It's sold as a paperback,which most people buy.
It's also sold as Kindle.
I've had some sales of peoplewho say are on a commuter train and
want to read it.
I always, I remember a guy whobought the paperback book.

(01:02:43):
Oh, maybe close to two yearsafter it came out in March of 2016.
And he said to me, Mr.
Hoffman, we're in a restaurant.
He says, Mr.
Hoffman, you know, I've never.
I haven't read a book in along time.
I said, what's a long time?
He says, since I graduatedhigh school 38 years ago.
I said, you haven't read abook in 38 years?
He said, yeah.
I said, I'll tell you what.
You buy the book, I'll signthe book.

(01:03:05):
Because he came into the restaurant.
I see him, if you don't likethe book, I'll reimburse you the
money of what it costs for the book.
He says, oh, great.
Okay.
So he.
He buys the book.
He gets the book on a Friday.
I see him on a Monday, and hesays, I couldn't stop reading.
I couldn't put it down.
When you said, once you startreading this, he will have a hard
time putting it down.
I thought you were giving me asnow job.

(01:03:26):
But you were right.
I kept going.
My wife wanted to go to a restaurant.
She wanted to go shopping.
He said, no, I'm reading the book.
So I said, well, I hope Ididn't cause you any marital problems.
He says, otherwise, I'll haveto have Big Louie and Guido have
a talk with your wife, becausethey do make home visits.
They will come door to door,you know.
And he started laughing.
But you get that, because likeI say, in my case, it's the perspective

(01:03:50):
of a young person, but I'mgoing into a lot of stuff that people
don't know, and they find it interesting.
They find it interesting.
So that's how you can get my book.
I'm not on social media, youknow, I don't have.
I don't have a smartphone.
There's maybe a reason for that.
I have a flip top.
I don't know how to text, so Idon't text.
So, yeah, I stay away fromthings that could be problems.

(01:04:11):
Well, I will tell you, thankyou for putting it up on Kindle.
This is mine right here.
This is how I read.
I have a lot of books that Ihave to read, being part of my job.
I do have a hardcover andpaperback books, but it's books that
I've been grateful enough toget from authors like you that signed
them for me.
But my preferred readingmethod is Kindle because I'm always
on the go.
Audiobooks is always anotherbig thing, too, because we get through

(01:04:34):
the books quicker.
And the guy that you gave thebook to is absolutely right.
It is absolutely a Page turner.
I had to actually force myselfto go to bed.
I started reading the book at9 o'clock one night and I looked
up and it was 1am I had lostall track of time because the book
is just that interesting.
So everybody needs to go outand get a copy of Inside.
We will drop the links down inthe show notes of how you can do

(01:04:56):
that.
So in closing, Scott, is thereanything that you would like to say
to your fans or readers outthere that you'd like them to know?
There's one thing, David, foryou and all the wonderful listeners
that listen to your program.
When the clerk says, do youwant a receipt?
Don't take it.
We will keep that in mind.
Scott, it has definitely beena pleasure having you on the show.

(01:05:19):
Very enlightening.
You taught me a couple ofthings today.
Being a true crime podcaster.
I felt like I had readeverything and knew just about everything
I needed to know about the mobuntil I met you and read your book.
So thank you for the great insight.
Anytime you wish to come back,you know how to get a hold of me,
just let me know.
Thank you very much.
All right guys, that was theincredible Scott M.

(01:05:42):
Hoffman.
Again, you can get his bookInside right now at Amazon, paperback
or even Kindle edition.
Do yourself a favor, go outand get yourself a copy of this book.
You will not be sorry.
Forget everything else thatyou probably read or heard about
the mob.
This from somebody that was onthe inside of that and there's a
lot of things that he canteach you.

(01:06:03):
All right?
So once again, again, thankyou for joining us.
I know you have many optionsin True Crime and Interview podcast.
I am grateful for the last twoyears you have chosen me and I hope
that you are being good toyourself and to each other.
And always remember to alwaysstay humbled.
An act of kindness can makesomeone's day.

(01:06:23):
A little love and compassioncan go a long way.
And remember that there is anextraordinary person in all of us.
And I'll catch you guys on thenext one.
Don't forget to rate, commentand subscribe.
Join us on social media.
One link to the link tree hasit all.

(01:06:45):
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(01:07:07):
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