GIOVANNI ROCCO is the pen name of a remarkable American law enforcement officer who spent most of his twenty-six year career as a member of state and federal task forces targeting organized crime. He was given an opportunity to work in covert operations early in his career, and over time, he undertook a number of undercover roles inside a wide range of criminal enterprises. As effective as he was in those investigations, they pale beside the culminating role of his career—the successful infiltration of one of America’s most violent and long-standing Mafia families. That investigation was a long term, deep cover undercover operation lasting two and-a-half years, his primary assignment being to engage members and associates of Italian Mafia families and gain their trust. His primary target was New Jersey’s DeCavalcante crime family, commonly referred to by FBI investigators as “the real Sopranos.” Rocco became so fully trusted by Charles Stango, one of DeCavalcante’s primary capos, that the latter went “on the record” for him and put him in charge of his own crew. He was permitted to attend meetings with other high-ranking members of the family, as well as with senior members of other New York Mafia families, and to speak on his capo’s behalf. It has been nearly forty years since any undercover operative has reached that level of acceptance in a Mob family (cf. FBI agent Joe Pistone—aka Donnie Brasco).  At the conclusion of this landmark investigation, Giovanni retired from law enforcement and, after a series of nerve-racking missteps, an FBI threat assessment enabled him to finally move his family to a location that, for obvious reasons, must remain undisclosed.