Inside Bianca Censori’s gangster family: How Kanye West’s in-laws went from poor Italian immigrants to drugs and gambling kingpins… and her uncle’s chilling nickname
Her father has done time for drug possession and one uncle was sentenced to death for murder, while another has convictions for violence – meet the mob family of Bianca Censori.
The architecture graduate, who is grabbing headlines for her weird and wonderful wardrobe, tied the knot with rapper Kanye West two years ago and the first thing she did was reveal the family skeletons.
Bianca’s Italian born father Elia ‘Leo’ Censori was jailed in 1982 for five years for possessing heroin and like his brothers revelled in their origins and modelled themselves on the crime families from their homeland.
The same year her uncle Eris – a notorious gangland killer once dubbed ‘Melbourne’s Al Capone’ – was sentenced to death for the murder of Perth waiter Michael Sideris.
Eris was also given eight years for possession of heroin in a later trial and fined $20,000 Australian dollars – almost £46,000 in today’s money.
However, the sentence was later commuted on ‘royal prerogative of mercy’ to life imprisonment.
The death penalty was abolished in Western Australia in 1984, although the last execution in Australia took place in 1967.
He later applied to serve his sentence closer to home in Melbourne where his elderly parents lived and he was eventually released in 1999 but ordered to remain on indefinite parole.
In 2015 he attempted to have the restrictions lifted and although he impressed the judge by defending himself the decision was upheld and he is still living under the imposition of the court.
Meanwhile eldest brother Edmondo, known as ‘Eddie Capone’, has convictions in Victoria for violence, including assaulting police, theft and threats.
As well as heroin dealing, Leo also has convictions for possession of a pistol and fully jacketed ammunition.
In 1991, Leo’s former wife Faye Glascott spilled the beans on his illegal gambling empire.
She told a local paper reporter from the Herald Sun that Leo had been involved in a cartel that controlled a large slice of a lucrative illegal gambling industry in Melbourne during the 80s.
Ms Glascott at the time said her former husband – who ran a slot machine firm – had made a fortune from illegal gambling.
‘Leo can stack money better than a bank,’ she said as she revealed how she had found rolls of money – up to $40,000 – hidden around their Alphington home and recalled seeing about $60,000 sitting on their coffee table.
At one stage in the early 1990’s Leo was also given a police escort as it emerged their was a contract out on him with rival gangsters aiming to kill him so they could rob his takings.
The local newspaper quoted his former wife as saying Bianca’s dad was a ‘heavy criminal figure’.
She added: ‘I was fighting with him because he was going into the kitchen to measure things using my utensils. I didn’t like that stuff in my home. It was a nightmare.’
The Herald Sun exposed Leo Censori in 1991 back when The Age’s John Silvester worked there
Leo Censori’s ex-wife blew the whistle on his life of crime in 1991 in Melbourne’s Herald Sun
Leo Censori as he appeared in the Herald Sun in 1991
Pictured left is Bianca’s mother Alexandra, second left is Bianca herself, second right is Bianca’s sister Alyssia and far right is Bianca’s other sister Angelina
Kanye West (left) finally met his Australian in-laws in Tokyo, seven months after he tied the knot with Melbourne native Bianca Censori (right)
Bianca Censori is the daughter of Melbourne gangster royalty
The family had packed up their belongings at the home in the Abruzzo region of central Italy to start a new life Down Under.
As a teenager Eddie was known to hang around suburban coffee bars in Melbourne before the family went into the games machine business before going on to be linked to violence and drugs.
While the party-loving Bianca was enjoying the friendship of former schoolmates in Melbourne, her father and uncles were pulling in large amounts of money from their criminal activities.
Ms Glascott said her ex-husband had made a career out of studying gamblers and working out what they wanted.
She said: ‘He knows what gets them in. Some players lose large amounts of money and then try to win it back. They never do.
She said of his illegal gaming empire: ‘Those machines make wheelbarrows full of money.
‘Some people love him but they have to love him, his machines put money in their pockets … They are all creeps.
‘They say that they like him because he makes them money. When he went to prison, none of them wanted to know about it.’
Ms Glascott suggested Leo ‘would never change’ his wicked ways’.
She added : ‘I tried to coax Leo into going into a legitimate business; to use his money, to turn it into white money, to go into something where he didn’t have to worry about it.
‘But there is the criminal in Leo. He gets a buzz out of the police trying to catch him and he beats them by changing the programs on the machines. He gets a buzz out of that.
‘He loves the lifestyle; that’s why he’ll never change.’
Ms Glascott and Leo divorced in 1989 after 15 years of marriage.