Nation: Portrait of an Obsolete Mobster

EVICTED from the Mob’s top hierarchy in 1964, Joe Bonanno of New York—one of the bloodiest killers in Cosa Nostra’s history—eventually retired to Tucson, Ariz., where, amid his fig and orange trees, he now lives modestly, reflecting on his days of power and plotting his comeback. His life is not entirely normal, however. The FBI tried, unsuccessfully, to recruit his confidant and all-round handyman, David Hill, 21, as an informer. Once a bomb landed in Bonanno’s backyard. He thinks that an FBI agent may have prompted two young thugs to throw the bomb and start a fight between Bonanno and another mobster—a sequel to the “Banana War” that followed his downfall,

Bonanno may get support for his bizarre notion. Tucson authorities are preparing to try two men for attempting to dynamite Bonanno’s house. A prosecution witness claims that an FBI man put them up to it. Thinking that Bonanno has been badly treated, young Hill last week volunteered to talk about his boss to TIME Reporter James Willwerth. The following is Hill’s portrait of an obsolete mobster:

Like many other retired executives, Bonanno finds the routine irksome. Most mornings Hill drives him into town, where Bonanno attends to errands until about noon. Returning home—a rather small, three-bedroom house at 1847 East Elm Street—he usually lunches on an Italian sausage sandwich, then puts on a “ghastly-looking” pair of Bermudas for a couple of hours of sun and reading in the yard.

Shortly before dinner, Bonanno changes into slacks and as a never-changing rule, sits down with a snifter of brandy and provolone. After dinner, preferably goat meat or scampi and Pouilly-Fuissé (1959 or 1961), he has a cigar, reads the newspapers and watches television newscasts, ending up with a late movie. His favorite stars are Alice Faye and—of course—George Raft.

Except for Hill, whose blond good looks, shaggy hair and modish clothes could easily mark him as a jet-setter, there is almost no one else around. It is a sad contrast to his high-rolling days, when prominent clergymen, judges and politicians felt it an honor to be entertained at the home of the mobster known as Joe Bananas. When the Government tried to deport Bonanno in 1954, for instance, among those who testified as character witnesses were the Most Rev. Francis Green, former Congressman Harold Patten and former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Evo DeConcini (the Most Rev. Francis Green is now the Roman Catholic bishop of Tucson).

Now Bonanno’s heart condition keeps him close to Tucson—the fact that a grand jury in New York wants him for questioning may also be persuasive—but he is not really at home. Newspapers ride him. Substantial gifts to the Roman Catholic Church and philanthropies have somehow failed to make people forget about his background.

Bonanno often walks back and forth for hours, deep in thought. Hill says that he has seen him touch the tips of his fingers together, point them at the sky and moan: “I am in the world for 64 years, and only in the last five years have these things happened to me!” Other times he will be more philosophical: “I know it’s my fault. It was impossible for me to foresee these things.” He has only three ambitions now. One is to move closer to his children in Palo Alto, Calif. The second is to visit once more his birthplace and the graves of his parents in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, home of so many American Mafiosi. The third, which he apparently does not tell young Hill about, is to return to power, and, like Napoleon at Elba, he still dreams of the day when he can march home and reclaim his Cosa Nostra family.