I Married A Mobster: Recap of “Ebony & Ivory”

“Ebony and Ivory” is the story of Diondrea Hopkins Nicosia who was always attracted to bad boys and goes from mob mistress to mob wife.

Dion Hopkins grew up in Teaneck, New Jersey. She was a spoiled kid. Her father was a successful drug dealer, until he got hooked on his own product. When Dion is 3 years old, her father has already hit a point of crisis in his life. Dion goes on to say, that when she was in 5^th grade, her father was found floating in the Hudson River. She never really knew him.

As a teenager she loved to do modeling and acting and in 1984 her friend describes her as a “diva.” Dion doesn’t date white guys and is attracted to bad boys, “hustlers and dealers.” She and her friends used to say that white guys smelled like “wet dogs.”

Dion gets a job at an Italian Restaurant where older, white men (wise guys) would give her $50 tips for doing nothing. She was the only one there who was black. Working there was like one big party. She becomes “one of the gang” and is teased about her love life and the fact that she has never been with a white man. One day in 1995, Dion says, a beautiful, suave man walks into the restaurant, Angelo Nicosia. Suddenly, her opinion on white guys, needs to be reevaluated. Angelo was in construction and Dion was very attracted to him. Angelo pulled out all the stops to win her over. She describes their love making as non-stop and passionate. “It was good.” But, things were too perfect. Intense passion becomes replaced by doubts as Dion learns that Angelo is keeping secrets. He is married.

One day Angelo’s wife come by and they are surprised to see her at the restaurant. Dion says she didn’t look like she belonged with Angelo, she had “guidette” hair. Then someone tells Dion that Angelo is a hit man for the Genovese crime family and all the while she thought he had a construction business. She says he used to have guns and weapons in his truck, but when she asked about them, he never gave her a straight answer. Angelo was very secretive about his mob connections, but he was very public about his relationship with Dion. He got her nice gifts, clothes, jewelry, and flowers all the time. For her 23^rd birthday he bought her a Jaguar. Angel show off Dion to his mob wise guys. Normally they would not like the fact he was with a black woman, but the thing that saves him is that they all wished they were him, they all loved Dion. However, their wives were not very happy with her, maybe they were afraid their husbands would find black women too, Dion muses?

Angelo moves Dion into a townhouse and she becomes an official “goumah.” Angelo is there all the time. Her job was to look good for Angelo. She always had champagne and wine ready, she cooked pasta dishes and she took money from his stash to go shopping. She devoted herself to making Angelo happy. He would be with her all night and go to work all day.

One night in 1996 there is trouble. They are in the apartment having sex, when there is a commotion at the door. An unexpected visitor shows up banging on the door and yelling, “Ang, I know you’re in there!” The next day Angelo moves in with Dion and leaving his Sicilian wife for a black mistress. Angelo rebels against mob convention. His entire family was devastated. Divorce is not something they believe in. Angelo tells them if they want to see him they are going to have to see her too, so they meet her. Dion’s days of being a mistress were numbered. Angelo was getting a divorce and marrying her.

Angelo and Dion have a baby girl. Angelo is called in for an official sit down. He is told he is disrespecting his family and that he can’t marry Dion and divorce his wife. Angelo sticks to his guns. He is an associate, not a made man, so he gets away with the divorce and marrying Dion. He buys Dion a house in the Poconos and on February 5^th, 2005 baby Gia is born. Angelo’s family loved their daughter and called her all kinds of sweet Sicilian names. It was a dream come true for Dion, she had money, a housekeeper and a nanny.

On October 10, 2007 at 5:30 AM the dog is barking. There is banging on the door. Angelo is arrested in a mob sweep. It was a big scene in her neighborhood. The FBI arrests him for extortion and try to get him to talk and cut a deal. Dion learns a lot more about Angelo and is in shock. However, Angelo never cooperates and goes to trial. In 2008 he is convicted of extortion and is sentenced to 46 months in prison. Their daughter, Gia, is only 3 years old.

Angelo never ratted on anyone. Dion knew she had to go to work, the money was gone and she was left with bills to pay on the car and the mortgage. She gets three jobs to make ends meet and even tries to collect on debts owed to Angelo, without much success. While in prison. Angelo finds God. He gets out of prison next month, October, 2011 and intends to go straight. To do that successfully he would need to avoid his old environment and not get sucked back into the life.

Dion and Angelo have been together for 16 years. Will they make it? Time will tell.

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Picture Credit: Investigation Discovery

 

I Married A Mobster: Dion Nicosia “Ebony and Ivory”

Dion Nicosia was interviewed on the Joy Behar show, but until now, she has not been on Investigation Discovery’s website. According to their summary, being married to a mobster was expected to be especially difficult for Dion, as an African American woman.

She had no previous knowledge of the mob so when she gets involved with Angelo Nicosia she enters a new world. Her perspective, as an outsider not being raised in the lifestyle, should be very interesting.

There was a lot of money while Angelo worked for the mob and she enjoyed the lifestyle, but when Angelo went to prison, there was no money left. The lawyers ended up with most of it. Surprisingly, Dion says that she did not experience racism from the other mobsters. They all treated her well. Dion said that Angelo was arrested on extortion charges and will be released from prison in March 2012.

There will be more information on Dion and Angelo as we get closer to her episode. In the meantime, this Wednesday’s episode, “Daddy’s Girl” will focus on the life of Linda Scarpa, daughter of Greg Scarpa. We have many blogs up on the site on the Scarpa family, so just do a search in the box on the bottom right hand side of our blog for more information.

Picture Credit: Investigation Discovery

I Married A Mobster: Joy Behar Grills Mobster’s Wives

Joy Behar never tires of mob wives. She had a nice chat with the women of VH1’s Mob Wives when their show premiered a few months ago. Last night she chatted with three women, who will tell their stories, from ID’s “I Married A Mobster,” which premieres tonight at 10:30 PM.

The three women featured on the show were Cheryl Caruso, whose story airs tonight, Linda Scarpa and Dion Nicosia, a new addition to the lineup. The ever curious Joy, fired questions faster than a semi-automatic, trying the get the most information out of them in the 30 minute segment. She scored some “hits.“ The women all were very forthcoming about their stories and why they appreciated the opportunity to tell people what they went through.

Cheryl speaks first. She has been divorced from Philly a long time now. She says she never knew he was involved with the mob. As far as she knew, he was a businessman with a successful printing business in Manhattan. She never asked any questions about his work or how much money he made. When he went to jail, she had no money and was completely in debt with two very young daughters to raise. Up until that point, Philly had taken care of everything. She finally learned of his crimes when she walked into court and heard the judge rattled over a long list of crimes and sentence him to 15 years to life. That was all she heard and she couldn’t comprehend it. The bottom feel out of her ideally perfect world. She had to get three jobs to pay the bills and was literally working around the clock, while her mother helped her raise the children. She had to rebuild everything. When Phil was released, after serving 7 years, he was on her doorstep begging for her to take him in. Cheryl said she couldn’t allow him back in the home, she didn’t know who he was. She worked too hard to establish herself and make a life for her and the girls. Sure she liked the perks that the mob life afforded her, but she didn’t know that was where the money was coming from. One day her life was perfect and the next it was ruined. She is telling her story to close the door on it and move on.

Dion says that after her husband went to prison there was no money left. The lawyers ate it up. She knew her husband, Angelo Nicosia, was well connected in the mob. It was nice and she enjoyed the lifestyle. Joy wants to know if Dion, who is African American, experienced any racism from the mob. Dion answers, “No, she was surprised, everyone was wonderful to her. The men were all charming.” Joy adds, “Yeah, other than the murders.” Dion says her husband was arrested and convicted in 2008 of extortion and will be out in March 2012. Joy asks, if her husband has ever gotten violent with her. Dion says, “no he hasn’t, but I have hit him a few times.’ She says people are fascinated with the mob and she finds telling her story is very therapeutic.

Finally, we hear from “Little” Linda Scarpa, whose father was Greg Scarpa. Greg was known as a notorious killer and because of that earned the nickname, The Grim Reaper. He was head of the Colombo family. Linda comes across as quiet, demure woman with an air of sadness about her. She begins by saying that her father was a great dad, a typical dad, and that she grew up in Brooklyn. She found out about her father’s lifestyle when she was 16 years old. She had a Sweet 16 Party and she said about 200 made men showed up. She says, if you see the video of it, it was pretty morbid. Joy pipes in, “I’d love to see it.” She tells the story of when there was an attempt made on her father’s life. She was in the car behind his, which her baby boy in the back seat. They were pulling out of the driveway, her car behind her dad’s, when men jumped out of a van across the street and started firing shots at her father’s car. She was “in the way,” so some stray shots entered her car. She was 21 at the time. She says she loves her father, but she has anger and resentment towards “the life.”

She has four children, but is not currently married. She says that when you marry someone in the mob or are conceived by someone in the mob there is really no way out of it. There is so much pain you can’t get over. She says she has never spoken about her pain before. She has never gotten over the death of her brother. Her brother died from being shot on the streets because he no longer had protection from the mob. But, she never felt she had the right to express her grief because her father killed so many people and caused so much pain for others. Her father, Greg Scarpa, died of AIDS while in prison. He was sick and needed a transfusion. One of his friends, who had AIDS, donated blood which was never screened because he was a friend. Linda says she wanted to speak openly about what she went through and show the lifestyle is not glamorous. She says she is speaking because there is no one left to speak about it. No one who is left to worry about what she has to say. The Colombos were at war with each other, killing each other, and there is no one left. The only ones left to talk about the mob lifestyle are the women and children.

All in all, a very informative set of interviews skillfully “executed” by Joy Behar. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was made an honorary “mob wife” at some point in the future. The mob wife phenomena is quickly catching on and we are keeping on the look out for new shows in the near future. Are you listening Jenn Graziano, from JustJenn Productions? We need to know!

All written content is exclusive property of The Mob Wives Blogspot and is protected by copyrights or other intellectual property rights. You are prohibited from using, copying, altering, modifying, or changing our work. Unauthorized use of this is strictly prohibited. Violators are punishable under federal law. In simple English, stop f*cking jacking our work.