Valachi hearing, October 8, 1963: Valachi on Patriarca and the Boston bosses

Joseph Valachi testified that he met Raymond Patriarca around 1939 or 1940, that Patriarca was a member, and that he heard in prison that Patriarca had become the boss in Boston after Joe Bruno and Phil Buccola. Testimony, not a finding.

Date

1963-10-08

Kind

hearing

Source

National Criminal Justice Reference Service, scan of the printed hearings (NCJ 119303)

Retrieved

2026-10-12

Docket

Organized Crime and Illicit Traffic in Narcotics: Hearings before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, 88th Cong., 1st sess., Part 1

Rights

A work of the United States Senate, printed by the Government Printing Office. Public domain in the United States. 17 U.S.C. § 105. The NCJRS cover sheet records reproduction permission as "Public Domain / U.S. Senate."

Two passages from the October 8, 1963 session, on printed pages 283 and 289 of Part 1 (NCJRS PDF pages 302 and 308). No running date heading appears on these two pages; the date comes from the proceedings index, which places October 8 at pages 245 to 318.

On page 283 Chairman McClellan asked, “Do you know Raymond Patriarca?” Valachi said he had met him “around 1939 or 1940,” that he did not see him on the New York charts, and that “He is in Boston.” Asked “Is he a member of Cosa Nostra?” Valachi answered, “Yes, sir; he is.”

On page 289 counsel asked why Valachi had met Patriarca. Valachi said: “There used to be a boss in Boston around that time, his name was Joe Bruno,” who was later “replaced by another fellow which I know as Phil Bubona” (the OCR’s reading; elsewhere in the volume the name is Buccola). He went on: “I also heard about Raymond being the new boss in Boston. I heard that in prison.” He said the Boston men “did not interfere in any way with my racing.”

This is testimony, and the statement about Patriarca’s position is, by Valachi’s own account, something he heard in prison. It is not a finding.