Charles Carneglia was born on August 10, 1946, in Queens, New York, into a life that would eventually be submerged in the world of organized crime. Raised in a neighborhood deeply woven with mob influence, Carneglia’s early years were shaped by an environment where loyalty and silence were survival tools. Alongside his brother John Carneglia, Charles operated a junkyard in the East New York section of Brooklyn. But this wasn’t just any junkyard—it allegedly functioned as a multipurpose hub for mob operations, including car theft disassembly, drug trafficking, and even a hidden graveyard for murder victims.

It’s believed that their junkyard held the kind of dark secrets that only the underworld could understand. Rumors circulated that bodies were not just buried, but dissolved in acid, never to be found again. John, in particular, was said to have stripped valuables from the deceased before destroying their remains—gruesome trophies rumored to hang from the basement rafters.

Beyond business, the Carneglia brothers extended their influence into street mentorship. In the 1970s, they took in a young boy named Kevin McMahon, discovered sleeping in John’s pool house.

Charles Carneglia’s involvement in mob-related murders stretches back decades. He was implicated in the 1976 murder of court officer Albert Gelb, who was killed just days before he was to testify in a gun case against Carneglia. Prosecutors later alleged that this hit was orchestrated to silence Gelb permanently and protect the Gambino network.

In 1980, Carneglia was suspected in the disappearance and presumed murder of John Favara, a Queens man who had accidentally killed Gotti's 12-year-old son, Frank, in a traffic accident. Favara vanished shortly afterward, and federal documents suggest that his body was dissolved in acid by Carneglia—a method allegedly used more than once to dispose of victims discreetly.

Another confirmed hit came on October 4, 1990, when Louis DiBono, a Gambino soldier who had reportedly fallen out of favor with Gotti, was murdered execution-style in a parking garage at the World Trade Center. Carneglia was also reportedly involved in a 1995 conspiracy to assassinate John A. Gotti, the son of John Gotti, alongside enforcer John Alite.

After years of evading full conviction, the law finally caught up with him. In 2009, with the help of testimonies from former allies Kevin McMahon and John Alite, Charles Carneglia was convicted of racketeering, multiple murders, drug trafficking, extortion, and more. The court sentenced him to life imprisonment and imposed a $500,000 fine.

As of 2025, Charles Carneglia remains incarcerated at USP Canaan, a high-security federal penitentiary in Pennsylvania. He is inmate number 08773-016, with no possibility of release.