Original Gangsters Podcast · Original Gangsters, a True Crime Talk Podcast

The 1979 Mafia Commission Meeting That Almost Happened with Retired FBI Agent Dennis Buckley

·50 min·3 clips

Frank "Funzi" Tieri compared a human body with cancer to organized crime.

1. Original Gangsters Podcast focuses on the planned 1979 Mafia Commission meeting at Gurney's in Montauk, Long Island. 2. Guest Daniel Rosen is a senior investigative reporter at the New York Sun, and Dennis Buckley is a retired FBI agent who worked the case. 3. The episode asks why the FBI mobilized dozens of agents for a meeting that never happened and what the operation changed. 4. Rosen says he reached the story through interviews with former Brooklyn-Queens MRA agents such as Steve Carbone, Ed Guevara, Dennis Buckley, Ed J. Sharp, and George Hanna. 5. He says those agents worked on major New York cases including Lufthansa, Boston College, the Commission trial, and Pizza Connection. 6. Rosen describes the Bureau in 1979 as moving toward RICO, recorded evidence, and conspiracy cases instead of one-target investigations. 7. He says Gurney's was a Montauk resort with a long local history and ties to Nick Monti, a Brooklyn restaurateur who transformed it. 8. Buckley says he was a young agent, about 28 or 29, when a CI met him through a restaurant arrangement on Long Island. 9. He says the source was paid for information and helped the FBI penetrate organized crime through a structured contact system. 10. Buckley recalls that the source later identified the Miami and New York mob war as tied to Carmine Galante's murder in a Queens pizzeria. 11. Buckley says the meeting was expected to involve higher-ups discussing what came after Galante's death and Santo Trafficante's arrival from Florida. 12. Rosen says the source likely had ties to both the Genovese and Gambino leadership, including Paul Castellano. 13. He also says Joe Shepani, called Joe Shep, had a silent investment link to Gurney's and acted as a go-between for meetings there. 14. Rosen says Frank DiMatteo later confirmed Joe Shep's connection with a New Year's Eve 1979-1980 photo taken at Gurney's. 15. Buckley says the FBI treated the tip as high priority and sent agents, surveillance cars, planes, and cover personnel to Montauk. 16. He says a call from the TE reported that the phones were tied up and that the meeting still seemed to be on. 17. Rosen names Ed Tickle, Lisa Grobe, Bob Shortle, Steve Carbone, and Dick McDonald as part of the technical and legal effort. 18. He says the team was ready to use Title III procedures and recording devices, but the meeting was canceled and the target group never appeared. 19. The tone is interview-driven, archival, and detail-heavy, with Rosen setting context and Buckley giving first-person FBI memory. 20. Listeners interested in FBI surveillance, Mafia history, and RICO-era investigations will get the most from it, while listeners wanting a simple crime recap may skip it.

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