My Crime Fiction: 'The Face'

Below is another chapter of my crime novel in progress.  

You can read the first five chapters via the links below:

Paul Davis On Crime: My Crime Fiction: 'The Rigano Murders'

Paul Davis On Crime: My Crime Fiction: 'From South Philly To Sicily'

Paul Davis On Crime: My Crime Fiction: 'Salvie Shotgun'

Paul Davis On Crime: My Crime Fiction: 'Nick The Broker'

Paul Davis On Crime: My Crime Fiction: 'Upton "Uppercut" Clarke'

The story originally appeared in American Crime Magazine.

The Face

By Paul Davis

I live in a fine old house in the historic district of Girard Estate in South Philadelphia. 

I love the predominantly Italian American neighborhood, with its semi-attached homes with porches, tree-lined wide streets (wide by South Philly standards), its friendly and earthy neighbors, its parks, churches, restaurants, bars, and Italian delis. 

I take a long walk each day through the neighborhood. I enjoy walking the streets and visiting the nearby park. My dog died some years back, so I take my cigar for a walk. I often stop and speak to neighbors and to people who recognize me from the photo that accompanies my newspaper column.    

I covered my initial interviews with Salvatore Stillitano, once known as “Salvie Shotgun,” a “Mafia Prince” turned government cooperating witness, in my crime column in the local paper. Stillitano was pleased with the columns, which we agreed that I would eventually compile into a book.

For this interview session, Stillitano met me at a small Italian restaurant in Girard Estate for lunch. I had Chicken Parmigiana, a favorite meal of mine, and he had mussels in red gravy. We made small talk while we ate.

Stillitano, 74, was tall and muscular with a slight protruding belly. He had curly gray hair and coarse features, unlike his late father’s classical handsome features. But the son had the same cold, black protruding eyes as his infamous father, Nunzio “Nick the Broker” Stillitano, a caporegime in the Philadelphia Cosa Nostra organized crime family and the overseas representative of the National Cosa Nostra Commission.       

It was a beautiful spring afternoon, so after we ate, Stillitano suggested we do a “walk & talk,” an old Cosa Nostra way of discussing mob business while walking the streets to avoid planted FBI wiretaps in the mob clubhouses. I agreed and I turned on the voice recorder on my cell phone and placed it in in my shirt’s breast pocket.

Stillitano pulled out two medium-sized Cohiba cigars, and using a silver cigar cutter, he clipped the tips of the two cigars and handed me one. He then reached into his pants pocket and withdrew a box of small stick matches. He lit my cigar and then lit his cigar.

We smoked the fine cigars as we walked around the outside of the small Girard Estate Park, which was once the farmhouse of Stephen Girard, the financer of the War of 1812. We walked around the outside of the park as smoking in the park was prohibited by the city. Curiously, dogs can do their business in the park, but one can’t smoke there. 

Across the street from the park was the former home of the late Philadelphia Cosa Nostra boss, Philip “Chicken Man” Testa, who became boss after the murder of Angelo Bruno. A nail bomb exploded on the porch of the home in 1981 and brutally killed Testa. We talked about the murder as we walked across the street from the house.

Salvatore Stillitano, who confessed to the government that he murdered seven men while a member of Cosa Nostra, spoke of his return to the Catholic Church during his time in the witness protection program. He befriended a local priest, confessed his sins, including murders, and prayed for Jesus Christ to forgive him.

“I know you’re a cynical guy, a reporter and a South Philly street guy, so you probably think this is a scam, but my faith is the real thing,” Stillitano said. “Believe me or not, my faith is strong, and I know, I just know, that Jesus has forgiven me.

"Part of my penance is telling the world, especially my daughter and grandson, about this evil tradition of crime.”    

During our walk around the park, Stillitano spoke of his father’s Cosa Nostra rival, Carmine “Big Carmine,” Polina, the boss of the New York Gambone crime family, and a Cosa Nostra Commission member.

Polina wanted to take over Stillitano’s New Jersey operations, as he considered Stillitano an absentee landlord with Nick Stillitano often worked in Sicily brokering deals for the Commission under orders from Philadelphia Cosa Nostra boss Angelo Bruno and Luigi “Lupo” Bonfiglio, the boss of the Bonfiglio Cosa Nostra organized crime family in New York City.

As a student of crime since I was a teenager, I knew who Polina was. He was a big, violent and gregarious gangster. His hero was Al Capone. He was a large man, and he lived large. He was a psychopath who turned violent over the smallest slight or whim. He was called “The Face” when other gangsters referred to him.

He was called “The Face” due to his large head and large facial features - big nose, big ears and big mouth - as well as his broad facial expressions of joy and anger.

“He wore his heart on his face,” one mob guy wit said. Wisely, no one ever called Polina “The Face” to his face.

As I noted in one of my columns, New Jersey is the only state in America that has several different Cosa Nostra families operating there. There were the five New York families, the DeCavalcante New Jersey crime family, and the Philadelphia crime family. 

Bruno made Stillitano the capo of the Wildwood crew and instructed him to make peace and broker deals that settled disputes with the other crime families in New Jersey. 

In the early 1970s Nick Stillitano met with the New York and DeCavalcante capos and worked out deals. Polina agreed, but he planned to murder Nick Stillitano at some point in the future and take over Philly’s criminal operations in North Jersey.

Salvatore Stillitano told me that he spent summers in the 1970s with his father in Wildwood, New Jersey. He enjoyed the seaside resort town’s boardwalk amusements and the ocean and pools, but he even more enjoyed listening to his father’s stories about their tradition – the tradition of crime.

Stillitano related one of those stories to me.       

Anthony “Rosy” Ricci was a North Jersey bookmaker and Stillitano associate. He took  bets from some big-time gamblers and laid off action to other bookmakers for Nick Stillitano’s boxing bouts. Especially the crooked fights.

The 40-year-old tall and lean gambler was a cheerful man, which is why he was called “Rosy.” He was universally well-liked, which is why it was such a surprise to people that two thugs beat him unmercifully.

Ricci was sent by Nick Stillitano to a mid-town Manhattan bar to deliver an envelope to Gambone underboss Billy Mancuso. The envelope contained money that was a piece of the considerable winnings from a recent boxing match that paid off well for Bruno and Bonfiglio. 

Apparently, Polina did not like his share of the take, so instead of meeting Mancuso, Ricci was met by two Gambone soldiers who took the envelope, and pulling Ricci to the back of the bar, punched and kicked the bookmaker until he was unconscious. The two hoods left Ricci on the bar’s floor.

Bruno was furious, as was Stillitano, but the Philly boss made no attempt to contact Polina and confront him. He called Bomfiglio and requested a sit-down.

Luigi “Lupo” Bonfiglio arranged for the sit-down to be held in a small Italian restaurant that Bonfiglio secretly owned on Mulberry Street in New York's “Little Italy.”            

Nick Stillitano drove Bruno to New York City, and the two men entered the restaurant that had a sign on the door that read “Closed for Repairs.”

Inside the darkened restaurant Bruno and Stillitano passed two of Polina’s men at the small bar alongside Bonfiglio’s huge bodyguard and driver.

Bonfiglio sat with Polina at a table in the back of the restaurant as a busboy cleared the dishes of an Italian food feast for two that Polina alone devoured. Polina belched loudly as Bruno and Stillitano approached the table.

Bonfiglio, an elderly, small, rotund and balding man, waved for Bruno to come to the table. Polina leaned back in his chair and thrust out his large belly, revealing food and wine stains on his white shirt.

“Gavone,” Bruno whispered to Stillitano before they sat down.         

Bonfiglio stated that they were gathered at the sit-down to settle the dispute. Bruno, in a calm, clear voice said that Polina’s men assaulted his associate, a good earner, and broke his jaw, caused internal bleeding and other injuries. Ricci, Bruno said, was still in the hospital recovering from the beating.

“He was only bringing an envelope for you,” Bruno said. “He didn’t deserve a beating.”

Polina leaned forward and in a loud and gravelly voice said, “Your associate was disrespectful to my soldiers. He was acting superior to them, and they only did what was right.”

Bonfiglio held up his hands before Bruno could respond.

“Was a severe beating necessary?” Bonfiglio asked. “That seems to me to be over the top. They could have reminded Ricci that they were made men and given him a warning, and not a trip to the hospital.”

Bonfiglio’s crime family was far more powerful than the Gambone’s, so Polina sat quietly.

“It seems to me, Carmine, that perhaps you should at least pay for Ricci’s medical bills.”

Polina nodded in agreement.

“Sure, sure, OK, and I tell you what, I’ll throw in a couple of beans as a gesture of goodwill.”

Polina struck out his large, thick arm across the table and took Bruno’s hand in his sweaty hand that was as large as a baseball catcher’s mitt.

“Let’s have a cigar, coffee and a Sambuca,” Polino said.

“Sound good,” Bonfiglio said.

Bruno declined, stating that they had a long drive back to Philadelphia.

On the drive back home, Bruno growled and told Stillitano that Polina’s offer to give Ricci a couple hundred dollars for the brutal beating was insulting.

“Carmine was trying to provoke me, but I won’t be provoked. A crude and violent man like him will eventually bring on his own downfall.”

 

Several weeks later, Ricci, his jaw wired shut, was released from the hospital and was back at work at his “book” in Newark, New Jersey.

Ricci, still cheerful despite his injuries, spent the day hanging around the hardware store that was a front for his gambling business. His assistants manned the phones taking bets in a back room as Ricci sipped a vanilla milkshake through a straw.          

At five o’clock, he waved goodbye to his men and walked out of the store. As he walked towards his parked car, a man with a gun stepped out of a car and shot Ricci five times, killing him instantly.

The gunman stepped back in the car and the car sped off.

 © 2026 Paul Davis