South Brooklyn Boys

South Brooklyn Boys 

South Brooklyn Boys (SBB)
Founded	1970s
In	Brooklyn, New York, United States
Years active	1970s — present
Territory	South Brooklyn, Degraw Street, Union Street, 5th Street, Sackett Street, Bensonhurst
Ethnicity	Mostly Italian American
Membership	50+
Criminal activities	Assault, drug trafficking, extortion, bookmaking, racketeering
Rivals	Untouchable Bishops, The Mau Mau Chaplains

South Brooklyn Boys (abbreviated as SBB) is a famous New York City street gang that was formed some time around the 1950s in Brooklyn, NY. The gang has a mostly Italian American membership.

At the time of its origin, SBB consisted of several smaller neighborhood greaser gangs that were located in the South Brooklyn area of Brooklyn made up of Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill, Park Slope, Red Hook and Boerum Hill. Some of the gangs that made up the original South Brooklyn Boys were The South Brooklyn Devils, the Garfield Boys, The SB Angels, SB Diapers, The Wanderers, the Degraw St boys, the Sackett St Boys, The Butler Gents, The Gowanus Boys and the Kane St. Midgets. The label South Brooklyn Boys represented the loosely connected affiliation that all of these neighborhood gangs associated under.

The 1962 book, All the Way Down: The Violent Underworld of Street Gangs by Vincent Riccio and Bill Slocum, featured real accounts of the Gowanus Boys. The gang was located in the Gowanus section of South Brooklyn, and was one of the earlier neighborhood crews that would evolve into the larger, loosely affiliated South Brooklyn Boys street gang.

Reputed Lucchese mobster, Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso was a famous member of the early South Brooklyn Boys.^[1][2]

Since the 1950s, South Brooklyn Boys has represented not only the original 1950s gang, but many generations of kids growing up in the South Brooklyn area, most specifically the Italian section of Carroll Gardens. The term has not only been used as a gang association, but also as a loosely connected affiliation for which many neighborhood kids felt a kinship. From the 1980s to the present, a new incarnation of the South Brooklyn Boys has been very active. Currently about 50 members ages 17 to 28 years of age.

Gang sets

The South Brooklyn Boys consisted of 10 different gangs.^[3]

·         South Brooklyn Angels

·         South Brooklyn Diapers

·         The Wanderers (featured in the film The Wanderers)

·         Degraw Street Boys

·         Sackett Street Boys

·         South Brooklyn Devils (Union Street 4th Ave.)

·         Garfield (Garfield Street and 5th Street)

·         Butler Gents

·         Gowanus Boys

·         Kane Street Midgets

References

1.      ^ Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires, by Selwyn Raab, Page 470

2.      ^ The Brotherhoods: The True Story of Two Cops Who Murdered for the Mafia By Guy Lawson, (Page 147)

3.      ^ StoneGreasers.com - South Brooklyn Boys