233: Part 2: The Real Sopranos: Informants, Betrayal, Survival, with Seamus McElearney
Game of Crimes
Game of Crimes
4.8 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 4 February 2026
⏱️ 70 minutes
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Summary
Murph continues his gripping conversation with Seamus McElearney, a former FBI Special Agent fighting organized crime from the inside. This episode dives deeper into the deadliest phase of mob investigations: informants, witness protection, betrayal, and survival.
Seamus pulls back the curtain on the real-world Mafia behind The Sopranos, revealing how the DeCavalcante crime family—the so-called “Sixth Family”—operated in plain sight while federal agents worked tirelessly to dismantle it. He explains why flipping a capo is never as simple as it sounds, how trust becomes a weapon, and why one wrong move can get people killed.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | These kids decide to rob a Colombo social club. And our witness just happened to be there who was a pretty decent size guy. And he had a recording device. They come in and they rob the club and they let around go through the ceiling. You can't make this up. The next day, these boneheads, they butt dial one of the guys in the club because they knew them. And they're talking live saying, oh, yeah, I put that fat bump on like the |
| 0:23.1 | floor, blah, blah, blah. So the Colombo guys call them and tell them, come down to the club. And these |
| 0:28.7 | stupid kids come down to the club. Our witness with a recording device is in the club, not knowing this |
| 0:33.5 | was going to happen. They were going to kill these kids. They had guns in their mouth, |
| 0:38.0 | everything, going to kill them. Our witness steps in, and he had an asp, and he tuned them up pretty good, |
| 0:44.2 | but he saved their life. He saved their life because they were going to get killed. They were going to |
| 0:48.1 | kill them. He intervened and stopped it. I'm Steve Murphy, DEA Special Agent Retired and now host of the Game of Crimes podcast. |
| 0:56.1 | If you've seen the Netflix series Narcos, then you know my story. I now bring you stories of |
| 1:01.8 | heroism and bravery from our law enforcement and military heroes and occasionally from the |
| 1:07.8 | criminals that they faced. Welcome to Game of Crimes. |
| 1:23.1 | Hey folks, welcome back to Part 2 of This Weeks episode of Game of Crimes with Murph in the |
| 1:27.3 | morning. If you didn't see yesterday's episode, please go listen to that before you listen to today's because it sets the background. And our guest today, Seamus McAleurney, who's a retired FBI agent, who was a case agent, and a working agent also before he became a supervisor, but working against the Decaval Conte crime family, |
| 1:45.3 | the Manano crime family, and we're going to talk about the Colombo crime family. These are all mafia groups. This is one of the really, really good interviews where he's getting into it. I'm trying to be as quiet as I can. You know me? I tend to go off on my little tangents every once in a while, but he's really going into a lot of detail |
| 2:00.8 | and explaining things. |
| 2:02.4 | He's got a book out that I really, really highly recommend. It's called |
| 2:05.6 | Flipping Capo, which was a member of the DeCavocante family who flipped, which was the first ever. |
| 2:13.0 | But it's called Flipping Coppo, how the FBI Dismaneled the Real Sopranos. |
| 2:20.1 | Did you watch the soprano series on TV? |
| 2:21.4 | I have. |
| 2:25.7 | And a lot of things that he talked about yesterday sounded very familiar to what I saw on TV. But the producers say there were no advisory technicians, subject matter experts, |
| 2:33.5 | whatever consultants from law enforcement on |
| 2:36.3 | the show. |
... |
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