Rocco Pelosi

Rocco Pelosi is a character in the Grand Theft Auto series, appearing as a central character and the secondary antagonist of The Ballad of Gay Tony. He returns as a supporting character and minor antagonist of Grand Theft Auto V.

Rocco is a made man in the Algonquin based Ancelotti crime family. He works alongside his uncle, Vince, an Ancelotti enforcer. Gay Tony owes him money, thus forcing him and TBoGT's protagonist Luis Lopez to work for him.

Background
Pelosi was born in 1980 in Little Italy, Algonquin.

He is a made member of the Ancelotti Crime Family and a distant relative of both Giovanni and Gracie Ancelotti. He is often seen alongside his uncle Vince, being more influential within the family than him despite his young age. Rocco's exact status in the crime family is unknown, as well as his connection to Ancelotti capos Tony Black or Frankie Garone.

Events prior to The Ballad of Gay Tony
Some time prior to the events of TBOGT, Tony Prince borrowed a huge loan from Don Giovanni. Due to Tony being unable to pay his debts to the Ancelotti family, Giovanni sends Rocco and Vince to make weekly collections from Tony.

Events of The Ballad of Gay Tony
Rocco appears for the first time in I Luv LC when he and Vince are collecting money from Tony. He also meets Tony's bodyguard Luis Lopez and immediately throws racial slurs at him in a similar fashion, calling him a "spic" and a "taco", prompting Luis to respond and refer to Rocco as a "guido". He also voices his clear dislike for Tony, as he frequently mocks him with slurs such as "fag", knowing Tony is not in the position to fight him back. Behind his back, Tony and Luis agree that he is a "wannabe" who is "out of his league" and they constantly mock him.

After some time, Rocco tasks Luis and Tony to help him interrogate a union official at a golf course. However, members of a rival crime family attack the place. After the mobsters are dealt with and if the official is not killed, Rocco leaves with him, presumably to further interrogate and kill him.

This help from Tony and Luis does not wipe out the debt and Rocco again gives a mission to Tony and Luis: seduce the girlfriend of Vic Mazano and take over his club. Luis ends up killing Vic and barely makes it out alive after a ambush by Triads. Luis suspects that Rocco set him up.

Rocco is seen again in Tony's apartment, during a coke party. Some guests of the party include Evan Moss and Gracie.

In a complex chain of events, the diamonds attract thieves who kidnap Gracie and demand the diamonds. Giovanni Ancelotti makes a truce with the original owner of the stolen diamonds, Ray Bulgarin, and both blame Rocco, Tony and Luis for the incidents. Rocco, in a twisted gesture of compassion, offers to spare Luis and own the clubs with him if he personally kills Tony. Although he briefly considers it, Luis instead kills Uncle Vince and is about to kill Rocco, but Tony saves him by telling Luis that he is a made man. Rocco then flees. Shortly after, Luis and Tony fight off a Russian hit squad.

After TBoGT
Rocco is not heard or seen again after the completion of the story. If the player calls Rocco's number after Departure Time, Rocco's voicemail message states that he has fled Liberty City to "lay low" for a while.

Events of GTA V
Rocco appears in GTA V where he is shown to be in Los Santos after he escaped from Liberty City. After coming to the city, Rocco left the mob business and became a corrupt talent agent, who organised an extortion scheme by persuading famous actors to demand bigger paychecks from their studios in order to halt productions and blackmail studio executives into buying him out.

He also seems to be still interested in the club business as it is reported at the Daily Rag that he's about to turn an abandoned warehouse in East Los Santos into an EDM superclub, fitted with "jacuzzis, chicks in cages, sparklers in the bottles, different themes per floor and open 24/7". It was scheduled to be open the next year from the game time. When the game takes place, Rocco attempts his scam once more with movie producer Solomon Richards' most recent movie, Meltdown. However, Solomon sends former bank robber Michael De Santa to threaten Rocco into giving up his extortion. Michael sneaks into Rocco's building and confronts him on his helipad, beating him severely and then forcefully taking the actor and director he'd been withholding back to the studio.

Death
Later on, a vengeful Rocco and his friend/associate Gianni break into Solomon's studio and assault Solomon for sending Michael after them and failing their scheme. However, Michael arrives just in the nick of time as he was about to meet with Solomon and after helping up Solomon to get up on his feet, Solomon tells Michael to get Rocco and Gianni. Michael obliges and chases both Rocco and Gianni out of the studio and throughout the city. After wrecking their car, Michael kills Gianni and then kills Rocco as well.

Personality
From his appearances, Rocco is shown to be an extremely arrogant, sadistic, cocky and disrespectful Ancelotti gangster who shows open contempt towards Luis and Tony and is rude to almost everyone he encounters.

Rocco and his uncle Vince have a dark sense of humour derived from their sadistic pleasure of making other people around them miserable and their delight in bullying and mocking them in whatever way they can and make them feel uncomfortable. Like Vince, Rocco is openly racist and homophobic, as he uses various racial and homophobic slurs towards both Luis and Tony (such as "fag","homo", "spic" and "taco") as they know very well that Tony can't and won't fight back. Luis, however, is not afraid of Rocco and does not put up with his and Vince's harassment and bullying, as evidenced when he fires a similar racial slur ("guido") in Rocco's direction.

Rocco takes great pride in being a member of the Ancelotti family and being related to Don Ancelotti and his daughter and often expressed his belief that his connections made him untouchable. Despite all of this, Rocco usually avoids brutal violence and rather makes somebody else perform violent acts on his behalf. Despite his supposed connections, Rocco's true colors reveal that he is a very cowardly individual as he fled Liberty City the moment his uncle was murdered to escape from Tony and Luis' wrath.

Luis voices his contempt of Rocco to his face and distrusts him (for example, he claims that Chinese Takeout and Boulevard Baby were both traps set by Rocco to kill him). Rocco, though normally very disrespectful, prefers Luis and occasionally delegates to him when trying to restrain or exclude Tony. Rocco also showed that he has a small degree of trust in Tony's business practices - despite saying his judgment is clouded by a "midlife crisis", as he sees a very big monetary value in Maisonette 9.

Rocco appeared to like Luis more than Tony (even though Tony tried any way he can to pay off his debts to the Ancelotti crime family) and he offered to wipe out the debt if Luis kills Tony. Ironically, Luis killed Vince instead and was ready to shoot Rocco when Tony defended him and said it was a bad idea because Rocco is a "made man". With this act, Tony saved Rocco's life, even though Rocco heavily insulted him and was going to have him killed by Luis, who couldn't kill his friend because of "second thoughts".

Trivia

 * His name is possibly a reference to "Rocco P", a trendy brand of women's boots.
 * Rocco, Miguel and Ryder are the only antagonists who did not directly attempt to kill the protagonist.
 * Rocco's character model could have been taken from Tommy Johnson from the movie "Football Factory" (which Rockstar produced). Rocco wears a similar polo shirt to Tommy, and also share similar facial features. Tommy Johnson was played by Danny Dyer, who also voiced Kent Paul in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
 * Rocco also bears some resemblance to Armando Torres, as they have similar facial appearences.
 * Although Rocco is stated to be a made member of the Ancelotti Family (not being killed in Party's Over because he's a "made guy") it is also suggested that he is only an associate working his way up, for example he once asks Gracie to "tell the Don I'm on the up" indicating that he has not yet earned Ancelotti's approval, and is therefore not a made man/soldier. It is possible that he simply wants Ancelotti to know of his earning power to be considered for the position of Capo however Tony also says Rocco is small time suggesting he has little or no standing within the family. It is possibly an oversight.