IT was to be a celebrazione, a party, an old-fashioned T-shirt, hot-dog and straw-hat festival of ethnic pride. Manhattan's Columbus Circle was roofed with plastic streamers in red, white and green, the colors of the old country. The guy wires hummed in the breeze as an organ on the bandstand piped out random tunes for the early arrivals. Vendors set up rows of gaily colored booths to sell buttons (WE'RE NO. l), pennants (ITALIAN POWER!) and other paraphernalia of prideful protest. Now, in the already shimmering morning heat, the buses came rolling in from Corona in Queens, Bensonhurst in Brooklyn, Greenwich Village and all the Little Italys of the city. The occasion was the Italian-American Civil Rights League's second annual Unity Day, and it was meant to be fun for everyone.
No one was looking to enjoy himself more than Joseph Colombo Sr., 48, the league's burly founder, unofficial leader and chief promoter. The head of one of New York's five Mafia families of organized crime, Colombo had discovered a double life through the league. Started casually, in one year it grew into a genuine vehicle of expression for thousands of Americans of Italian descent who had nothing to do with the Mafia or crime. Harnessing their honest sentiments, Colombo had helped Italian Americans to achieve new pride—and managed to do a few things for the narrower cause as well, like embarrassing the Justice Department and The Godfather film makers into dropping the words Mafia and Cosa Nostra from their vocabulary.
Thus, on his day, Colombo moved easily through the crowd, shaking hands, joking, posing for photographers. Suddenly shots rang out, barely audible above the noise of the happy crowd. Colombo crumpled to the ground, bleeding heavily from the head and neck.
Almost immediately, another volley sounded and his assailant, a black posing as a photographer who only seconds before had been filming Colombo, pitched forward face down, dead. Later identified as Jerome Johnson, 24, he had been silenced by a still unidentified league captain, Colombo bodyguard, or someone posing as part of Joe's retinue. Johnson's killer escaped as professionally as he had carried out his mission, shooting Johnson three times even as police clustered around.
Hysterical spectators either rushed to see what was happening or fled in fear of more gunfire. There were confused shouts of "They got Joe! Joe's dead!" As word that the assailant was black rippled through the crowd, shock gave way to anger. Several blacks were roughed up. One, a musician who had been hired to entertain later in the day, was beaten by five or six men as onlookers shouted, "Kill him! Kill him!"
Life Follows Art
With blood streaming from the bullet wounds, Colombo was rushed to nearby Roosevelt Hospital. In a five-hour operation, surgeons removed the most damaging bullet, which had lodged in Colombo's cerebellum. Placed under intensive care, Colombo failed to regain consciousness, and despite the resurgence of some vital signs, was given only a fifty-fifty chance to live. Still, a less robust man might have never made it to the operating table. Said one doctor: "He's tough as hell."