Gaetano Lococo

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Gaetano Lococo, or Thomas "Tano" Lococo, was a Kansas City mobster who was identified as one of the "Five Iron Men" of Kansas City, Missouri following the Kefauver senate hearings in 1951. He was known within the KC family as a "made" member who served primarily as an enforcer in his early years and then controlled an interest in several illegal gambling establishments.

[edit] Arrival in Kansas City

In the 1930s his name was frequently mentioned in the local papers in association with major mob related events. He was identified in grand jury testimony as being one of the mob members assigned to facilitate the escape of the Union Station massacre suspects from Kansas City following that bloody event in June of 1933. He, along with Tony Gizzo, Charles Gargotta and Dominick Binaggio (brother of Charles Binaggio) allegedly provided a stolen car to the suspects and escorted them out of the city a few days after the massacre.

Two months later in August of 1933, Lococo was identified as probably being the suspect who escaped from Jackson County Sheriff Tom Bash following the infamous Armour Boulevard shootout. Charles Gargotta, Sam Scola, Gus Fasone and a fourth unidentified mobster (Lococo), attempted a hit on Ferris Anthon, a rival gangster that was interfering with the KC mob's bootlegging operations. Gargotta and Lococo had been seen together earlier that night in a car parked down the street from a club operated by Anthon on 15th Street in KCMO. A passing policeman had checked on the duo and had let them go when they indicated they were just waiting on a friend. As Anthon and his wife returned to their apartment building near Armour and Forest in a trendy area of the city, they were met by Gargotta and Lococo. Mrs. Anthon and her young son had already exited their car and were entering the building, when Anthon, who had lagged behind, was met with a burst of .45 auto pistol fire. Anthon died instantly from several wounds. Sheriff Bash, one of his deputies, the sheriff's wife and a teenaged girl were returning from a nearby party and were a block away when the hit went down. The sheriff directed his deputy to drive toward the sound of the gunfire. As they pulled to a stop at the intersection, Gargotta and Lococo had not yet re-entered their vehicle, which was idling nearby with Scola and Fasone in the front seats. Scola saw the sheriff's auto pull up and saw Bash exit the car with a 12 gauge shotgun. The mobster gunned the engine and plowed his getaway car directly into the Sheriff's car. Both Scola and Fasone opened fire from the front seat of their wrecked vehicle, but were quickly cut down by the Sheriff's riot gun (both died at the scene).

Meanwhile the killer identified as Lococo, attempted to run away from the scene (his headquarters at the time was in a political club a few blocks away). The sheriff's deputy exited his car and exchanged shots with the fleeing gangster, who threw down his gun and disappeared down an alley. As Lococo made his escape, Gargotta charged Sheriff Bash with guns blazing, but wisely surrendered when his already depleted magazines were empty. Bash took the Mafioso into custody.

Despite the efforts of the local police (who were very corrupt at the time), Lococo was never charged in the events surrounding the murder of Anthon and ensuing shootout. But in 1939, during a citywide cleanup campaign, Lococo was charged with income tax evasion and sent to prison for a short term. This would be the only major conviction of the gangster's career.

[edit] Later years

By the late 1940s, Lococo was troubled by a serious case of arthritis. As a result of the arthritis, he made frequent trips to the U.S. Southwest and to Mexico. In 1948, he moved to Nogales, Arizona for a brief time. While there, he purchased a small hotel and attempted to open a gambling operation based at it. The local sheriff however, was not receptive of the mobster, and Lococo sold the hotel and returned to Kansas City. In March of 1950, less than a month before the assassination of KC mob boss Charles Binaggio and Charles Gargotta, who had become the city's underboss, Lococo was identified as being present at a conference of U.S. and Sicilian Mafia members which took place at a hotel in Tia Juana, Mexico. The conference was broken up by Mexican police. Much speculation was later made during the Kefauver hearings that this conference had been to decide the fate of Charles Binaggio, although that allegation was never sufficiently proven.

Lococo went into "retirement" in Kansas City after the 1950s. He died of natural causes in the late 1990s. In his later years, a KC pizza restaurant ("Gaetano's") was named for him.