Infamous Former Mafia Members And Hitmen Reveal All On YouTube Channels

Former US mafia members are racking up millions of views on YouTube with tales of their lives in the mob.

Whether it’s Goodfellas, The Godfather, Once Upon a Time in America or The Sopranos, the public’s fascination with organised crime has manifested itself in a long line of movies, TV shows, documentaries and now, YouTube channels with content created by retired mobsters themselves.

For example, there’s Sammy ‘The Bull’ Gravano, the former underboss of the Gambino crime family who testified as a government witness in the prosecution of John Gotti. At the time of writing, he has more than 423,000 subscribers.

‘These stories are very compelling. You have people that listen to every word that comes out of their mouth. There’s an audience for it. They are both going to be million subscriber channels in no time,’ he said.

Christian Cipollini, a crime historian and author of Lucky Luciano: Mysterious Tales of a Gangland Legend, also told the outlet, ‘The trend of former organised crime figures transitioning, or parlaying their experiences and notoriety into pop culture media isn’t really a new trend at all,’ referring to earlier tell-alls and book deals, if not movie adaptations.

‘So in other words, if an opportunity exists – well, they’re opportunists. The YouTube era provides a contemporary media vehicle for contemporary mobsters. The only difference between the old era and now is technology, and perhaps the generational attitudes and differences.’