Alfred Salerno, described in reports as an associate of the Philadelphia crime family, was killed in the Bronx in the spring of 1980. His death followed the March 21, 1980 assassination of Philadelphia boss Angelo Bruno. Salerno’s brother-in-law, consigliere Antonio Tony Bananas Caponigro, had arranged Bruno’s murder without approval from the Mafia Commission, and both men were later summoned to New York under a false pretense.

On April 18, 1980, the bodies of Salerno and Caponigro were found in the trunk of a car in the South Bronx, reportedly battered and unclothed. Accounts say the killings were sanctioned by the Commission as punishment for the unsanctioned power grab, and that the double homicide precipitated further instability within the Philadelphia family.

Are there details about Salerno’s life in Philadelphia or the Bronx that could help clarify his role in the events leading up to his death?