Why is Joey Merlino Afraid to Name the REAL Rumor Spreader?

Original Gangsters News with Scott Bernstein. >> Welcome to the Original Gangsters News Network and Podcast. I'm your host, Scott Bernstein. Um, today [clears throat] we're going to talk South Philly and uh more Joey Marino/Georgie Borgi controversy. Um, and it's going to be a little bit of news, a little bit of editorializing. It's going to be a shorter than usual episode, but uh I felt the need to chime in here uh as a you know, as [clears throat] an add-on to the basic reporting that I've been doing with all of this overhaul in the Philly mob administration and the uh uh the splitting up of the you know the the holy I call it the holy Trinity of of Philly LCN the last 30 35 years Stevie Joey and Georgie who came up together and it always seemed to be predestined that pre-ordained that these guys would uh lead the Philly mob uh side by side hand in hand in lock step until they were old and gray uh and then they would ride off into the sunset. And this fearless trifecta uh has splintered and uh it's it was kind of a slow burn over a three-year period in the fallout from Skinny Joey Merino stepping down in 2023 to launch a podcasting career and all the issues that have spawned from that. And then eventually it it was too combustible and too volatile for those three best friends to uh stay in unison. And now they're kind of all off in their own separate camps. But uh what I want to discuss is the letter that went out beginning of the month. Maybe it was late July or early August. Um, and that letter was a bombshell. It was a nuclear missile shot right into the heart of South Philly. and the news about that letter or what was coming out in that letter or allegations that were in that letter about Georgie Borgghazi and his crew being shelved and having uh had some type of long meeting with cooperator Roger Fella. And this all came on the heels of our reporting at the OG about Georgie Borghazi stepping down as as the mafia down in Philly and being replaced by Mikey Lancelotti and and Stevie Mazone being behind the scenes pulling strings. Um, but this letter shook the landscape and there's been a lot of talk online about it from Joey Marino himself, you know, dancing around the issue. um conflating the issue, frankly, and in my case, kind of taking a a a weak approach to this as of right now in terms of who he's putting on blast and who he's putting out on Front Street, and we'll get into that in a moment. But, uh, we've also over the last couple weeks through fetting, uh, our sources and and trying to get to the bottom of what was and wasn't true in that letter, which went out to Mob Talk Radio and it was also in some form reported by Mafia Roundtable. Uh, there is no truth to Georgie Borghazi and his crew being shot. Um, there might be a small iod of truth to a face tof face between Roger Vela and George Borgghese. But if if that did happen, I'm [clears throat] told it was a a mere coincidence and a and a kind of a runin and it was 30 seconds and it was over. It wasn't an hourong sitdown, per se, at, you know, on the boardwalk in on the Jersey Shore. Uh but even though Georgie Borghazi and his guys aren't shelved, they, you know, they've lost standing and they've lost some stature and uh they have to, you know, earn it back now. However, you know, whatever happens from this day forward, Georgie is no longer boss as of the, you know, the start of the summer of 2026 and he's not in the administration. And I don't even think he's a capo. I think he's along with all the guys that had been his loyalists there. He's a soldier. Some of them are soldiers, some of them are associates. And uh he's going to have to kind of climb his way back in a similar way that he did when he got out of prison and he had been bumped down out of he had been consiliary uh and he was bumped down to soldier status and had get his crew back and then became a capo and then eventually acting boss and the boss. Uh, so this letter, there's so much speculation about it. A lot of people have now seen it. Most people that cover this stuff, most people that were were uh implicated in the letter or tied to the letter or mentioned in the letter have seen it. And we figured out, everyone is in consensus whether or not people are communicating behind the scenes or not, meaning that the kind of people that report this stuff, uh, of where this came from. You should also mention, I mean, who wrote the letter. Uh, we should also mention that Mob Talk Radio, Jeff Karsi and those guys have walked back the initial reporting and are now saying that what they reported originally about the shelvings and the meetings with Vela or meeting with Vela was all wrong. Whatever the case may be, there is some serious Mchavellian intent here. There are multiple people trying to play four, five dimensional chess here. A lot of misdirection, a lot of smokec screen, a lot of shape attempting to shape narratives. And a lot of it is tied to long-standing bad blood. Some of this bad blood, you know, I'm told might go all the way back to the 1980s. So, I what I really want to do here is again kind of what I've done from the jump, but I needed I needed to uh you know update it in terms of cutting through all of this white noise and separating fact from fiction. And there's a lot of conflation here. So Joey Merino has been very vocal in the last couple weeks about all the people uh chirping uh in the in the world of mob tube uh in in the world of you know the South Philly rumor mill uh online and chat forums and uh you know talking about unfounded rumors and people spreading gossip and people, you know, out, you know, the accusation, people outright lying, trying to uh undermine people's business relationships, personal relationships, marriages, and we'll get into we'll get into that as well. Uh, and he's talked about naming names, and last week he threw out Jersey Mike, who we've talked about on here before. He was the uh New York, New Jersey mob affiliate. He's not a mobster. He's not an associate. He's a legitimate businessman that has some family and social affiliations to those guys. Um, and then Bokea Joe, Joey Marino's brother-in-law, uh, who, you know, they're estranged and Bokea Joe is no longer on the scene. Philly's uh, piece persona there and Danny Herman, the kind of the hip-hop empressario uh, in Philly that had at one time had a relationship with Joey and his team and they fell out. Uh, and Joey has throw those names out as the people that are spreading rumors or, you know, outright lying about things. You know, also, you know, the Domalis and the Gene Barllas. But where he was, you know, where he was going with this was at least implying that this is where the letter came from, which is completely false. Um, and when he's talking about rumors and misshaped narratives, really the only thing that's being discussed in Philly LCN world in terms of news right now is this shakeup in the administration and this, you know, frame of this bond that had existed for decades between Joey Stevie and Georgia. So when he's talking about rumors, that's if you know, all things being even and you're not reading his mind, that's what people are spreading rumors about. And I can tell you Jersey Mike, Boa Joe, Dan Herman, none of these guys know anything about modernday Phil Philly LCN politics. They don't have the knowledge to be spreading the rumors that Mr. Marino seems to be accusing them of spreading. Now, I know it took me 10 minutes or 11 minutes to get to my my big point here is not only do do all of the people that cover this stuff know about the letter, have seen the letter, and know where the letter came from, who it came from. Joby knows. Joey and his people know. And Joey's not frankly man enough to put that name out. And it's not my job to put it out. I I don't think it's any one of us, you know, outsiders jobs to put it out. uh the sit down has talked about it and and Jeff over there, you know, he knows he said it's ain't you know he that's one thing we don't agree on anything but but we we will agree on this you know it's not he said it's not my job to put it out and I agree it ain't my job to put it out but if you're going to be standing on a soap box and pointing fingers and trying to make alg ations of, you know, rumors that are being started and that are intentionally uh, you know, misinformation and are being positioned to try to, you know, dirty up a situation or make, you know, waters that are already murky murkier or undermine certain people's asense or cause certain people's dissents. The names that you're putting out there, it it's it's intellectually dishonest cuz I know that you know and you don't want to put the name out because frankly you're scared of the guy who who's doing this uh or you're afraid of the blowback that you'll get. This ain't somebody that is on the same level as Jersey Mike or Boach Cho or Dan Herman. He's on a whole he's in a whole other galaxy. Um and and you don't want that smoke. And I guess it's possible I could be proven wrong. I know that uh Joey and Snuff on the Skinny are doing some type of live uh tonight. So maybe he'll prove me wrong. And and if he does, believe me, it it's it's Fourth of July fireworks times a million. Uh because the person that's behind the letter is a big fish. And his motives for for doing this, I'm still not totally sure. I I have some suspicions. At the end of the day, I don't think that whatever his goal was met, frankly, I think it's kind of backfired a little bit. But Joey knows, Joey's team knows, Georgie Borgghazi knows, Steve Mazone knows, Mikey Lance knows, the uncle knows. Uh, so I if Joey hadn't been out there teasing that he's putting people on blast and all these uh rat rumor starters need to be put in their place, I wouldn't be saying anything. But to come out and and there's been a couple podcasts now and there's going to be another one and throw out names of people that you don't like and you have issues with, but these are people that know nothing about what's going on in the inner sanctum of of Philly mafia affairs and would wouldn't have the access to the knowledge that you're seem to be accusing um at the very least implying that that they're behind this. Um it's just very disingenuous. And if if when this live goes down Tuesday night and if if it's just more hate being thrown at Jersey Mike Boca Joe and Dan Herman, Don Sakali, Jean Barello. Um, it's all hot air and and there's nothing, you know, there's really there's no there there. Boa Joe's been out of the circle of trust for three years now. Uh, Jersey Mike was a business partner of Joey Merino. That's it. Jersey Mike isn't a mobster. He's not a made guy. He's not somebody that's in meetings or uh you know in circles that he would know about the inner workings of the Philly Mafia administration. Dan Herman is a is like a a music guy who is in, you know, PR or or promotions and was helping Joey promote uh the Skinny brand when it first launched. And they had their falling out and and you know, Dan is as far away from, you know, the mafia gossip mill as [laughter] anyone. He, you know, he knows the very basics. But to to be putting those names out as the people that are spreading these rumors or again, at least implying it, it's just it's not true. It's misdirection on your part and it's it's it's really running away from the true source of all this and and not wanting to go all the way with with what you're threatening. You're kind of half stepping into that threat. So, you know what I will say as I'm wrapping up here, uh, and something I I want to apologize for to Joey and his camp, you know, the the bashing of Debbie and all that is is wrong. I apologize for, you know, I did a live a couple weeks ago where I had Jean and um Wayne Chrysberg and Dan uh Dan on and even though it wasn't me doing the, you know, the, you know, running down Debbie, uh I, you know, it's my show, it's my channel, and I shouldn't have allowed it. And uh I apologize. I will say regarding Debbie, what is not off limits is when you're talking about the Johnny Gong's murder because that's an unsolved homicide that is still being actively pursued um by the FBI and I believe the Philly the local authorities and Debbie was the reason or one of a number of reasons that Johnny Casanto uh got whacked out in the you know, in the early 2000s. So, I think it's fair game to bring her up when you're talking about that particular investigation or that particular situation while being respectful and and showing some uh grace and class. And I feel like that's what I've done in my coverage of of the Johnny Gongs hit. But it's not cool to just come on here and or come on anywhere and uh just disparage her because of her connection to somebody that you don't like or that you have issues with. So I want to apologize for that. But it it's really uh it there will be a whole news if this ever does. Maybe it will never come out. I mean, there's a chance that they it will never be public who sent this letter, but if it does come out and the people that have the right to put it out put it out, it it's it's explosive. And you know, again, I'll give credit where credit is due. That was uh you know, that the sit down was was saying that as well. Um, and the letter in itself, the the contents of the letter are salacious and there's accusations that are lielist and slanderous or lielist, slanderous. Um, there's there's allegations of illegal activity. There's stuff that gets very personal and, you know, it's a it's radioactive. You know, it's uh it's not signed. So, I think there's some plausible deniability there in regards to some of the fingerpointing, but it's understood where this came from. And forget about the people that that chime in and report on this. It's known by everybody in in Philly, LCN, and in New York who who threw this grenade out. Um, I'll just say what I said before in in talking about who this person is. It's a guy. It's a made guy uh in the Philly LCN. It's been around a long time. Has a lot of respect. um you know both uh in and out of of of Philadelphia. So it's uh it's it's still curious to me what the exact play here was. Um I know what it looks like on the surface, but it it still it still vexes me there. There's still uh it's still quizzical to me how this person thought this was all going to play out and how it would benefit him. So that's that's my my commentary here. Uh please like, share, and subscribe the original gangsters news network and podcast. We are at the forefront of all the reporting about uh the reshaping of the Philadelphia mafia, the Bruno Scarfl crime family, which had been led by the Merino camp for the last three decades. And now that that triumvirate of of Joey, Georgie, and Stevie um has fractured and it it can't really be called the Marino camp in regards to who's running Philly LCN. And uh as we've said again before, this is the Stevie Mazone era. And Stevie will take this family in whatever direction he sees fit. and um he'll uh remodel this thing in in in the way that uh he wants and it's it's going to be a new look. The the Joey Marino show was over with. It's been cancelled. You can go find it on the internet and on social media, but in regards to Philly Mafia and somebody that led the family for three decades and then even when he was supposedly sheld, still had a lot of influence for the last three years, that's over with and uh it it's now the Stevie Mazone show. So, but this the person that sent the letter, I think you could interpret that as, you know, he wants it to be his show, too. And and he's looking for a way uh into a serious leadership pos position at the very top of the family. So, like, share, and subscribe. The original Gangsters News Network and Podcast. I'm Scott Bernstein. and original gangsters uncovering the underworld. One city, one region, one country at a time. I'm out.