Giovanni’s Ring is the story of “Giovanni Rocco,” a New Jersey police officer, known undercover as “Giovanni Gatto,” who was the mysterious agent at the epicenter of Operation Charlie Horse, a federal undercover operation that ultimately brought down ten members and associates of New Jersey’s DeCavalcante Mafia family, the criminal organization known as “the real Sopranos.”
Giovanni spent nearly three years working his way into the DeCavalcante hierarchy. He was so convincing in his role that capo Charlie “The Hat” Stango eventually assigned him the task of killing Luigi “The Dog” Oliveri, a troublesome made member of the crime family. That lethal assignment brought the undercover operation to an end in March 2015, and the resulting string of high-profile arrests eviscerated the criminal organization.
Giovanni’s Ring is not simply a chronicle of Giovanni Rocco’s adventures in the murky and dangerous Mafia world he inhabited, but also a fascinating window into the psychological struggles that such a life inevitably entails.
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Review
“Very few undercover agents (UCAs) have been able to successfully infiltrate the inner sanctum of Cosa Nostra. Giovanni Rocco is one of those UCAs. This page-turner is a must read if you want to experience Giovanni’s dangerous and oftentimes violent journey inside the real-life Sopranos.” – Joaquin “Jack” Garcia, retired FBI UCA and author of Making Jack Falcone
“Once again truth trumps fiction in this riveting account of an undercover cop from New Jersey burrowing deep into the confidence of mob killers and made-men straight out of Hollywood Central Casting. Giovanni Rocco, himself a product of the streets of Bayonne, risks his marriage and family spying for the FBI on an assignment where a mere slip of the tongue or discovery of his hidden recorders could kill him. From page one of Giovanni’s Ring, the jeopardy is constant, the stakes high, and the prose pure Jersey.” — William C. Rempel, author of At the Devil’s Table
“This account of Giovanni Rocco’s many years’ work to infiltrate the ranks of the Jersey Mob drips with authenticity and crackles with tension from the first page to the last. But what sets it apart is Rocco’s unflinching honesty concerning the cost of such work to his family, his marriage, and, ultimately, his very soul. You will likely read this at an unbroken gallop, just as I did.” — Les Standiford, author of Bringing Adam Home
“Giovanni Rocco and Doug Schofield tell a terrific, fast-paced story about Giovanni’s undercover penetration of the DeCavalcante crime family. But what makes the book compelling and different than other Mafia tales is the often chilling incidents in which Giovanni found himself close to being exposed by the Mob, and the psychological torment that put him and his family through. Giovanni’s Ring is a great crime story about a man who rose from the streets of New Jersey to help destroy a notorious crime family.” — Anthony M. DeStefano, author of The Deadly Don
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