William "Big Billy" D'Elia (born June 24, 1946) is an American former mobster who was the head of the Bufalino crime family and protégé of family namesake Russell Bufalino. Because of his close relationship with Bufalino and his hitman Frank Sheeran, law enforcement had long believed that D'Elia knew many details of Bufalino's long history within organized crime, including his alleged role in the 1975 disappearance of former Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa.
D'Elia grew up in Pittston, Pennsylvania and began working with the Bufalino family in the mid-1960s as Bufalino's driver and gofer. Rising through the ranks, D'Elia avoided scrutiny from law enforcement for many years. D'Elia was said to be a mediator among mob families, meeting frequently with gangsters from across the country including the Philadelphia crime family, Los Angeles and New York City. But his skill at avoiding the press and law enforcement left many unanswered questions regarding his life with the Bufalino family.
Following Bufalino's death in 1994, D'Elia assumed control of the family and expanded the organization into legitimate operations such as waste management and controlling shares of Spanel Transportation and the Newcastle Group, the latter of which is a suspected money laundering operation.
In 1990, D'Elia was implicated in a money laundering operation involving The Metro, a newspaper in Exeter, Pennsylvania. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) charged that over 3.0millionindrugandprostitutionmoneywashiddenasrevenuefromfictionalMetronewspaperadsandsubscriptions.TheMetroclosedin1998.OnMay31,2001,IRSagents,USPostalServiceInspectors,andPennsylvaniaStatePoliceobtainedsearchwarrantsforthehomesofseveralBufalinocrimefamilymembers,includingD′Eliaandhismistress.TheagentsseizedrecordsrelevanttoataxevasioninvestigationfromwhichD′Eliaclaimedalossof6 million while reporting $8,000 in gambling operations in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
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