His smile quickly turned into a scowl as a gaggle of G-men stopped to talk to him about the holiday season, specifically about some Christmas cheer he had just received from some of his crew members.

"What the fuck are you breaking my balls about now," he muttered as he opened the front passenger-side door of his car as FBI agents brandished a search warrant that allowed them to search him for financial records and cash.

Graziano, 61, (right) has spent little time behind bars during his career, but the very wealthy gangster has seen several relatives, including two daughters and two sons-in-law, get socked by the feds in recent years.

His daughter Jennifer, a former graduate student at New York University, and an ex-son-in-law, Hector Pagan, who was

Daughter Lana and estranged husband John (Porky) Zancocchio, a Bonanno soldier, are due to be sentenced next month – Lana for tax fraud and Porky for tax evasion and loansharking charges.

But on Dec. 19, FBI agents were looking to nail the top dog of the Graziano family, who has served as the Bonanno family's acting consigliere since Anthony Spero (left) was convicted of racketeering charges last April.

Tipped that Graziano crew members would be passing along their mandatory Christmas "tributes" to T.G. – envelopes filled with cash – that night, FBI agents were looking to gather evidence that federal prosecutors in Brooklyn could use in a racketeering case.

Underworld and law enforcement sources disagree about some details, but by all accounts, the FBI seized $5000 stuffed in a single envelope and about $1200 more from Graziano, who got a receipt for the cash and was allowed to go home, or somewhere else, to drown his sorrows.

When push came to shove in the form of a 12 year sentence, Chin opted to trust his own bloodlines rather than the blood oaths of other alleged killers like himself to protect his financial interests on the docks in New York, New Jersey and Florida. So, when Gigante went to federal prison in 1997, son Andrew – by all accounts, an unmade man – began serving as his eyes, ears and messenger, the indictment said.

What a difference between Gigante's actions and his words to Gotti at a 1988 Commission meeting in Greenwich Village when the Chin reacted to Junior Gotti's induction into the Gambino crime family.

"I don't know why anyone would want to bring his son into the life," said Gigante, according to accounts by two high level mob turncoats who were there, Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano and Anthony (Gaspipe) Casso.

But it’s really no surprise that Chin would use his son to assist him with his crime family affairs. After deciding in the late 1960’s that he didn’t want to

Chin's brother, Rev. Louis Gigante, (right) has long served as family spin doctor, proclaiming his brother's mental failings. The priest often accompanied the so-called Oddfather on strolls through the streets in his pajamas, and appears holding his brother's arm in news photos and footage of the often-staged "sightings."

Besides, by using a trusted blood relative, Chin was following in the tradition of the wiseguy whose name still adorns his crime family, Vito Genovese. Genovese, whose last conviction – for drug trafficking in 1960 – was Gigante's first, used a brother to act in his behalf.

When Genovese was convicted and sentenced to 15 years in 1960, he

From 1960 through 1968, according to FBI documents, Michael visited his brother many times at federal prisons in Atlanta and Leavenworth, Kansas to keep Vito informed about his end, finally selling his share of the company for a reported $200,000, a few months before Vito died at the prison hospital in Springfield, Missouri in 1969, shortly after this mugshot – unearthed by the folks over at The Smoking Gun – was taken.

In the early 1970's, Erb Strapping's license to operate on the docks was revoked because of its mob ties, but Michael Genovese was never charged with a crime.

Last week, Andrew was released on $2.5 million bail and ordered to stay away from his father, who is expected to arrive from his Forth Worth, Texas prison hospital for arraignment on racketeering charges next week.