Zerilli's Hoffa burial location gains some credibility with old map

Former mafia underboss: Jimmy Hoffa buried where house, barn used to be on Jack Tocco's Oakland Township property

OAKLAND TOWNSHIP, Mich. – Former Detroit mafia underboss Tony Zerilli says Jimmy Hoffa is buried where there used to be a house and barn near Buell Road just east of Adams Road and north of Orion Road in Oakland Township.

View: 1974 map of property where Zerilli says Hoffa is buried

Records obtained by the Local 4 Defenders show Zerilli is right about the house and barn that used to sit on former mafia boss Jack Tocco's property. An aerial photo shows what the property looked like when Hoffa went missing in 1975. In the photo, the house and barn are right where Zerilli remembers. He says he was told Hoffa was killed and buried in a shallow grave on the property.

"This property was all being developed at that time by Jack Tocco, and he was supposed to, at that time, been the boss," Zerilli said. "There was a house and a barn. Where are they going to put him?"

Special section: The Hoffa Files

Local 4 experts say it is more than enough to get federal investigators on a plane and to the site to take a look. If they do, Local 4 experts say technology exists to allow investigators to see if anything unusual is buried.

Zerilli says Hoffa would have been killed in the barn. Former FBI special agent John Anthony says if he was, in fact, killed in the barn, there could be DNA proof.

"The new forensic evidence that are available, if he was killed inside and there were blood stains, they don't go away. The bones, if that's what happened, would still be available," said Anthony.

To find Hoffa or proof of his murder on the property, the feds need to get onto the property. They have two possible ways of doing that: permission from the owner or a search warrant, which requires a judge to agree that there is a reasonable likelihood that evidence would be found.

Zerilli admits he is looking for a payday, but it will come only if he is right.

"If I'm wrong, then I'm wrong. If he's not, if there is no remains that identify he was buried, then I got nothing. But if he was buried there, I got something," he said.


Zerilli says Jimmy Hoffa is buried where there used to be a house and barn near Buell Road just east of Adams Road and north of Orion Road in Oakland Township.


The property is private which means federal investigators would need permission or a warrant to search it.