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Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme, the once powerful New England Mafia boss who was serving a life sentence behind bars for the 1993 killing of a Boston nightclub owner, has died at the age of 89, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
Salemme died on Tuesday, according to Bureau of Prisons’ online records. Bureau officials did not immediately respond to an email seeking more information on Sunday. Salemme’s death was first reported Sunday by WPRI-TV.
Salemme led the Patriarca crime family in Boston in the early 1990s before helping prosecutors convict a corrupt FBI agent after learning that other mobsters had been talking about him to authorities.
Salemme, who has admitted to a slew of other gangland killings, was living in Atlanta under the name Richard Parker when remains of the nightclub owner were unearthed in 2016, making the elderly ex-Mafia don a government target once again.
Salemme’s 2018 trial became a flashback to the days when the mob was a feared and powerful force in New England. Salemme maintained he had nothing to do with Steven DiSarro’s death, but was convicted after his onetime best friend testified against him.
Salemme participated in numerous killings in Boston’s 1960s gang wars and spent 16 years behind bars for trying to kill a lawyer, who survived but lost a leg, when his car was blown up in 1968.
