Born in Brooklyn on 19 January 1921, little is known about Bentvena's early life other than that he grew up in the same area as DeSimone and Hill. In 1959, Bentvena became an associate with the Gambino crime family and in 1961 became a full member, or made man. Bentvena was a protegé street soldier for Carmine Fatico and later John Gotti. In May 1958, Bentvena became a member of what would become known as The Ormento Group, a heroin smuggling ring ; "Managing Directors" were Carmine Galante and Anthony Mirra. On February 14, 1959, Bentvena went to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to complete a drug deal for Joseph "Joe The Crow" DelVecchio and Oreste "Ernie Boy" Abbamonte. When he arrived in Bridgeport, undercover police arrested Bentvena and charged him with possession and exchange of narcotics. Bentvena was later convicted of heroin smuggling in June 1962 alongside co-defendant Carmine Galante and sentenced to 15 years in the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, Connecticut.
Murder
After his release from prison in 1970, in the book Wiseguy, Henry Hill said that they threw a "welcome home" party for Bentvena at Robert's Lounge, which was owned by Jimmy Burke. Hill stated that Bentvena saw Tommy DeSimone and jokingly asked him if he still shined shoes and DeSimone perceived it as an insult. DeSimone leaned over to Hill and Burke and said "I'm gonna kill that fuck." Two weeks later, on June 11, 1970, Bentvena was at The Suite, a nightclub owned by Hill in Jamaica, Queens. Late in the night, with the bar club nearly empty, DeSimone pistol-whipped Bentvena. Hill said that before DeSimone started to beat Bentvena, DeSimone yelled, "Shine these fucking shoes!" After Bentvena was beaten and presumed killed, DeSimone, Burke, and Hill placed his body in the trunk of Hill's car for transport. They stopped at DeSimone's mother's house to get a shovel and lime. They started to hear sounds from the trunk, and when they realized that Bentvena was still alive, DeSimone and Burke stopped the car and beat him to death with the shovel and a tire iron. Burke had a friend who owned a dog kennel in Upstate New York, and Bentvena was buried there. At the time of his murder in 1970, Bentvena was 49 years old and was a respected and feared made man in John Gotti's crew and in the Gambino crime family.
Aftermath
About three months after Bentvena's murder, Burke's friend sold the dog kennel to housing developers, and Burke ordered Hill and DeSimone to exhume Bentvena's corpse and dispose of it elsewhere. In Wiseguy, Hill said the body was eventually crushed in a mechanical compactor at a New Jersey junkyard, which was owned by Clyde Brooks. However, on the commentary for the film Goodfellas, he states that Bentvena's body was buried in the basement of Robert's Lounge, a bar and restaurant owned by Burke, and only later was put into the car crusher. On January 14, 1979, DeSimone disappeared. It is speculated that the Gambino family ordered the death of DeSimone, a mob associate with the Lucchese crime family, for his role in the unsanctioned murder of Bentvena and Ronald "Foxy" Jerothe. A theory is that the Gambino family did not know about the Bentvena murder and that Gambino captain John Gotti may have just wanted revenge for DeSimone's murder of Jerothe, another Gambino associate and good friend of Gotti's. When Henry Hill was facing a heavy sentence for cocaine trafficking, he turned state's evidence and testified at the trials of James Burke and Paul Vario. Charges were attempted to be prepared against Burke for the murder of Bentvena. However, they did not stand on account of Hill claiming to be the sole witness to the murder whilst he was also an accomplice, and DeSimone having been murdered several months earlier.
In the 1990 Martin Scorsese film Goodfellas, the character Billy Batts was portrayed by Frank Vincent. His exchange with the character Tommy DeVito at the welcome home party has been described as "iconic". The insult by Batts to DeVito—"Now go home and get your fucking shine box!"—has been considered among the most memorable lines in cinema history.
