Mobfather: The Story of a Wife and a Son Caught in the Web of the Mafia
George Anastasia [is] our most important chronicler of the decline and fall of Italian America’s dark glory, La Cosa Nostra.
Bill Tonelli, former editor, Esquire and Rolling Stone
In Mobfather, George Anastasia exposes what it really means to be married to the mob—and fathered by it. As revealed in their harrowing personal accounts, life for the wife and sons of Thomas “Tommy Del” DelGiorno became a descent into hell. When Maryann Welch ignored misgivings on her wedding day and plunged into marriage with the small-time gangster, she could not have foreseen how swiftly his greed and bloodlust would propel him to the highest ranks of the South Philadelphia Mafia.
In the end, guilty of a raft of crimes that included multiple murders, Tommy Del served less than a year in prison in exchange for turning government witness during a dozen trials against fellow mobsters. Revisiting his gangland classic, the author follows up on the fates of all the major players. Based on years of reporting, thousands of pages of court testimony, and extensive interviews, Mobfather takes the reader deep into the heart of corruption.
George Anastasia, a former reporter for The Philadelphia Inquirer, is the author of five books of nonfiction. Four of these, including Mobfather, are about the Philadelphia mob. He has won many awards for investigative journalism and magazine writing.
