Martial arts master Thomas Pitera was a deadly Mafia hitman who killed — and dismembered — up to 60 victims throughout the 1970s and '80s.
U.S. Drug Enforcement AdministrationThomas Pitera, a.k.a. Tommy Karate, may have committed as many as 60 murders.
There were plenty of violent guys in the mob, but few bore names that told you exactly what kind of hurting you were in for quite like Tommy Karate. His real name was Thomas Pitera, but given how often he employed martial arts while fighting, calling him “The Karate Guy” seemed like a perfect fit.
However, Pitera was no action movie star. He was as cold-blooded and dangerous as any other big-time mobster. As a member of the Bonanno crime family, Tommy Karate eventually rose through the ranks until he became a captain of his own crew — and one of the family’s most feared hitmen. He also came up with a grisly method for hiding his victims’ bodies from police dogs.
Although he would only be found guilty for his involvement in six murders, it is estimated that he could have killed as many as 60 people. He’s still behind bars to this day, a startling reminder of just how recently the Mafia ruled over New York City.
How Thomas Pitera Became Known As Tommy Karate
Thomas Pitera was born in Brooklyn on Dec. 2, 1954. He was bullied as a child due to his quiet nature and high-pitched voice, and that bullying led him to develop an interest in martial arts to defend himself. He was also reportedly a fan of the 1960s television show The Green Hornet, which starred Van Williams and Bruce Lee.
Public DomainVan Williams and Bruce Lee in The Green Hornet.
This passion for martial arts eventually led to a teenaged Pitera training in Tokyo for two years, where he honed his skills and knowledge while also embedding himself in Japanese culture. Despite his nickname, he didn’t study karate but rather Togakure-ryū, a type of ninjutsu. Regardless, by the time Pitera returned to Brooklyn, he looked almost unrecognizable from the scrawny, bullied kid he had been.
But that’s not to say that Thomas Pitera came back to the U.S. an enlightened man. As DEA agent Jim Hunt would later tell the New York Post in 2009, “Tommy was a psychopath, an animal. He’d walk into a social club and the guys would all turn to face him. No one wanted their back to Tommy Pitera.”
And author Philip Carlo, in his book The Butcher: Anatomy of a Mafia Psychopath, described Pitera as “remorseless and deadly,” a man who “took human lives as if he had a God-given right, while at the same time dealing high-grade Sicilian heroin and South American cocaine.”
The name “Tommy Karate” certainly suited Thomas Pitera, but make no mistake: His lighthearted moniker masked a truly evil nature.
Thomas Pitera’s Rise Through The Bonanno Crime Family
It’s not entirely clear how Pitera got involved with the Bonanno crime family, but it’s obvious that he quickly became one of the mob’s most feared killers.
“He was the baddest of the bad,” Carlo told the New York Post. “He scared the bad guys.”
He initially worked under Alphonse “Sonny Red” Indelicato, Frank Lino, and Dominick Trinchera, but he was eventually embraced by Joseph Massino, who was a rival capo to Pitera’s bosses. In the 1980s, Pitera officially became a “made man” and got to work under the orders of Anthony Spero.
However, he really made a name for himself in the underworld in August 1988, when he allegedly killed Willie Boy Johnson, a driver for Gambino family boss John Gotti. The hit was reportedly put out by Gotti himself, though, as he’d learned that Johnson had been working as a government informant for nearly 20 years. Naturally, the foul deed earned Thomas Pitera Gotti’s favor, and he would later ask Pitera to kill again on his behalf.
Public DomainWillie Boy Johnson, the Gotti associate-turned-informant who was allegedly killed by Thomas Pitera.
Unfortunately for Pitera, his knack for killing would eventually catch up with him. He was one of the few Mafiosos to break a golden rule: no murdering women. In 1987, he shot Phyllis Burdi to death because he believed she’d supplied his wife with the drugs that led to her fatal overdose.
It wasn’t just that Thomas Pitera was a killer, though. Lots of men in the Mafia were killers. It was the way in which he murdered people that made him a monster. Carlo describes in his book how Pitera murdered Talal Siksik, a man he believed was squealing to the authorities:
“He walked to the bathroom, got undressed, neatly folding his clothes. Then, without a second thought, he got in the tub with the body. He turned on the water in a steady flow, so the blood would be immediately washed down the drain. Without hesitation, Pitera proceeded to remove Talal’s head, arms, and legs. When the body was in six pieces Pitera calmly put what was left of Talal [inside the trunk]. With that he turned up the force of the water, washing down the remnants of the blood. He then took a long, careful shower, got out of the bathtub, and casually began to dry himself.”
Of course, throughout all of this, Thomas Pitera was running other operations, including drug trafficking, extortion, loan sharking, and robbery. These crimes were what eventually put him on the radar of the DEA — and brought about his downfall.
How Drug Trafficking And Murder Landed Tommy Karate A Life Sentence
Thomas Pitera had already been on Jim Hunt’s radar for years by the time the 1990s rolled around. The DEA had slowly been building a case against him, one that involved numerous stake-outs, wiretaps, and conversations with informants. He had been difficult to nail, in part, because of how thorough his method for hiding bodies was.
tommykaratepiteraartwork/InstagramTommy Karate practicing his martial arts moves while behind bars.
Then, on June 4, 1990, Pitera was indicted for heading a crew of drug traffickers and for seven murders, including Johnson’s. Of course, authorities always knew there had been more.
“Did he kill more people than we knew about? Yes,” Hunt told the New York Post. “Did he kill 60 people? No one knows for sure.”
When the DEA searched Thomas Pitera’s house, they found what Carlo called a “library of death.” Pitera had books on murder, dismemberment, and warfare. They discovered six bodies in the personal cemetery he had created on Staten Island. Even his old friend, Frank Gangi, turned on him after Gangi got himself arrested for drunk driving, despite the fact that he was only going to be hit with a ticket.
“This is about murders,” he told the arresting cop, “terrible murders.”
Prison Tales Network/FacebookThomas Pitera escaped the death sentence but will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars.
As The New York Times reported in July 1992, there was a huge debate about what to do with Pitera when his case finally went to trial. Pitera could have been the first person in New York to receive the death penalty for committing murder related to drug trafficking. As chief prosecutor David Shapiro said, “If Tommy Pitera doesn’t deserve the death penalty, who does?”
After six days of deliberation, however, the jury disagreed. While he was found guilty of six murders (he was ultimately acquitted of Johnson’s slaying), Tommy Karate was not put to death. He was sentenced to life in prison, however, and he remains behind bars to this very day.
After reading about the life of Thomas Pitera, the mobster known as “Tommy Karate,” learn all about 13 infamous mob bosses who changed the history of the Mafia. Then, read about nine mob wives who stood by their criminal husbands.
