Tough Nuts: Black Prince of Lygon Street

This week’s episode of Tough Nuts looks at Alphonse Gangitano, the same character portrayed by Vince Colosimo in the first season of Underbelly.

Gangitano was reputed as the “Black Prince of Lygon Street” -the same Carlton strip that saw two murders just over a week ago.

In this documentary, Gangitano is portrayed in dramatised scenes by actor Woody Naismith (pictured).

Alphonse Gangitano was known as the Black Prince of Lygon Street and was the most lethal member of Melbourne’s notorious ‘Carlton Crew’ in the 1980s and 1990s.

His death was one of the first of the Melbourne gangland killings when he was murdered in 1998.

Tough Nuts explores Gangitano’s life in careful detail – and looks at what turned him into a violent standover man and murderer after a loving, middle-class upbringing.

Through accounts from senior police and his criminal associates, Tough Nuts builds a fascinating profile on Gangitano, the boy who idolised Marlon Brando’s character in ‘The Godfather’ and wanted to be a gangster when he grew up.

Tough Nuts charts Gangitano’s crimes, the development of his pathological hatred of police and the event that took him over the edge – the affray at a Melbourne night club where he was arrested and where it seems, he decided to turn his back on a life of violent crime.

Sadly, Gangitano was in too deep for a last minute epiphany and eventually died at the hand of Jason Moran in 1998.

Featuring never-before-seen interviews with psychologists, police detectives and investigative journalists as well as dramatised scenes of some of the pivotal moments in Gangitano’s life, Tough Nuts delves deep in to the psyche of Alhponse Gangitano.

Presented by bestselling crime author Tara Moss, Tough Nuts is a fascinating eight-part series that blows the lid off Australia’s criminal underworld and reveals the real story behind what made and shaped the most notorious figures in Australian criminal history.

The 8 x 1 hour series profiles a different criminal in each episode and features, in order: Christopher Dale Flannery, Chow Hayes, Alphonse Gangitano, Dennis Allen, Russell Cox, Michael Sayers, Raymond Bennett and Lenny McPherson.

Tough Nuts is produced by Bryan Cockerill from The Full Box and is exclusive to Crime & Investigation Network.

Episode Three of Tough Nuts premieres on Thursday, August 26 at 7.30p.m on Crime and Investigation.