Mayfield Road Mob
| Founded by | Joseph "Big Joe" Lonardo |
|---|---|
| Founding location | Cleveland, Ohio, United States |
| Years active | 1900s-present |
| Territory | Greater Cleveland and all Ohio, Southern Florida, and Las Vegas |
| Ethnicity | "Made members" are Italian and Sicilian Americans and the associates can be both Sicilian and Italian, but many associates can be of different races and cultural backgrounds |
| Membership | 50 made members |
| Criminal activities | Racketeering, murder, car bombing, drug trafficking, skimming, labor racketeering, extortion, illegal gambling, construction, garbage collection, loansharking, bookmaking, bribery, assault |
| Allies | Chicago, Detroit, Genovese, Gambino, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, New Orleans and the Kansas City crime families |
| Rivals | various gangs over Cleveland, including their allies |
The Cleveland crime family is the collective name given to a succession of Mafia gangs, such as the Licavoli crime family (pronounced [liˈkaːvoli])or the Mayfield Road Mob, that were based in Cleveland's little Italy. The Cleveland crime family was an American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) crime family active in the Cleveland, Ohio and the Greater Cleveland Area from the beginning of the 1920s until the 1980s.
The Cleveland crime family originated in the early 1900s when the four Lonardo brothers (Joe, Frank, John & Dominic) and seven Porrello brothers immigrated to the United States from Licata, Sicily. The Lonardo and Porrello brothers first established themselves as legitimate businessmen. The two groups dabbled in various criminal activities including robbery and extortion, before prohibition, but were not yet considered a major organization.
At the start of Prohibition, Joseph "Big Joe" Lonardo was the boss of the Cleveland crime family. He was the second oldest of the four Lonardo brothers. He and his brothers began by supplying Cleveland's bootleggers with the corn sugar they needed to produce liquor. His top lieutenant was Joseph "Big Joe" Porrello, who supervised various bootlegging and other criminal operations throughout the early to mid-1920s.
In 1926, the Porrello brothers (Rosario, Vincenzo, Angelo, Joseph, John, Ottavio, and Raymond) broke away from the Lonardo family and formed their own faction. They established their headquarters on upper Woodland Avenue, around E. 110th St. In 1927, hostilities between the Lonardo and Porrello families escalated as the families competed in the corn sugar business. During Prohibition, corn sugar was the prime ingredient in bootleg liquor.
In the summer of 1927, Joseph “Big Joe” Lonardo, boss of the Lonardo faction at the time, left for Sicily, Italy amongst rising tension between the two families. He left his brother John and adviser, Salvatore "Black Sam" Todaro as acting heads of the Cleveland family. When Lonardo returned, a sitdown was scheduled between the Lonardos and the Porrellos. On October 13, 1927 Joseph Lonardo and his eldest brother John were to meet with Angelo Porrello in a Porrello-owned barber shop. Inside the barbershop, the Lonardo brothers relaxed into playing a game of cards. They were then ambushed by two gunmen and assassinated. This allowed Joseph Porrello to take over as boss of the Cleveland crime family and become the most influential corn sugar baron in the Cleveland area.
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