The Mafia Encyclopedia (119 page)

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Authors: Carl Sifakis

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Page 348
Jimmy "Jerome" Spuillante's position as boss of the New York garbage
collection racket afforded the boys numerous opportunities to
chop up bodies and have the remains trashed. Squillante himself is said to have
suffered a different fate when his turn came, being tucked in a car put
through a crusher.
Joe's throat. The body was cut up into disposable sections and hauled off by one of Squillante's trash trucks.
Squillante himself only survived the Scalises by three years. He was indicted on extortion charges and vanished. Apparently, the word went, it was decided that Squillante was not the sort who could stand the pressure of trial and prison. He was "put out of his misery."
Squillante's corpse was not carted away in one of his own vehicles. Instead, after he had been dispatched with a bullet in the brain, he was loaded into the trunk of a car, and the car was put through a crusher that brought it down to a compact scrap cube ready for melting in a blast furnace.
See also:
Scalise, Frank "Don Cheech
."
Stacher, Joseph "Doc" (19021977): Meyer Lansky ally
When a trio of Israeli journalists were engaged in the late 1970s in writing a biography of Meyer Lansky, their prime source of material was a former top syndicate mobster and longtime intimate of Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, Lucky Luciano and Frank Costello. Joseph "Doc" Stacher, who emigrated to Israel in 1965, revealed considerable information about organized crime in America, almost as much as the better-publicized informers. But, unlike the stool pigeons, Stacher wasn't tattling. Said the Lansky biographers: "He was so proud of Meyer that he felt we should know the truth about his old friend's exploits."
Stacher had reason to be grateful to Lansky, who made him a millionaire several times over, and Stacher was typical of many young gangstersJewish and Italianwho remained loyal to Lansky all their lives. Brought to Newark, New Jersey at the age of 10, Stacher quickly moved from juvenile thief to important member of the Bug and Meyer gang, headed by Lansky and Bugsy Siegel. In the 1920s he was running truckloads of bootleg liquor with the gang as well as aiding emerging New Jersey syndicate leader Longy Zwillman run many of his gambling enterprises.
In 1931 Stacher was the chief organizer, on Lansky's orders, of a meeting of all the top New York-area Jewish mobsters at the Franconia Hotel. At the conference, it was decided that the "Jewish Mafia" would merge with the Italian Mafia into a new national crime syndicatewhat eventually became organized crime in America.
Lansky made Stacher his man in Las Vegas, representing the mob's interest there, especially as a payoff man. He also operated as the official bribe paymaster to Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, who "allowed" the syndicate to build and operate lavish casinos on the island.
It was not until the 1960s that the U.S. government finally nailed Stacher for any meaningful charge, that of income tax evasion. Facing a five-year rap, Stacher could not be deported to his native Poland which would not accept him. Instead he made a settlement with Internal Revenue and immigrated to Israel, a right he had as a Jew under that country's "Law of Return."
Stacher worried if he would get Israeli citizenship and reputedly had his longtime close friend, singer Frank Sinatra, intervene through friends for an Orthodox member of parliament to come to his assistance. The M.P. owed Sinatra because the singer had contributed heavily to the American fund-raising done for religious educational institutes in Israel. To further aid the M.P.'s cause Stacher donated $100,000 for an Orthodox charity. Instead, the M.E used the money to build a kosher hotel in Jerusalem. Outraged at being ripped off, Stacher sued in a court case that drew headlines and laughs throughout the country. Israelis were amused that such a giant figure in American crime could be so taken by a meek-looking rabbi. Stacher was regularly referred to in the Israeli press as one of the leaders of "The Kosher Nostra," as distinguished from "The Cosa Nostra." In the end Stacher got his money back.
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After Stacher demonstrated to other Jewish mobsters that they could find a haven in Israel, scores followed his example. Lansky himself tried to immigrate in 1971, but public uproar as well as heavy pressure on the government by American officials made him too notorious and he was kicked out of the country.
When Stacher died of cancer in 1977, Lansky, back in the United States, sent an enormous bunch of red roses, the inscription on the ribbon reading: "To Doc from Meyer." Stacher's funeral was rather impressive by Israeli standards but was small potatoes compared to the gangland send-off he would have gotten in the States.
See also:
Bagman; Jewish Mafia
.
Standard Oil Building, Battles of the
The so-called Battles of the Standard Oil Building in 1926 caused Lucky Luciano to dub Chicago, "A real goddam crazy place. Nobody's safe in the streets." The fact that the remarks were made by a visiting New York businessman, gangster Lucky Luciano, goes far to explain why and how the term
Chicago gangster
became world famous.
In the first battle of Standard Oil, Hymie Weiss and Schemer Drucci, successors to the assassinated Dion O'Banion as leaders of the Irish North Side gang, were ambushed as they were about to enter the new 19story building on South Michigan Avenue. They were on their way to a bribe-paying meeting with Morris Eller, the political boss of the 20th Ward, who took care of protection for the mob's North Side speakeasies. Weiss and Drucci had just made it to the bronze Renaissance-style entrance when four gunners of the rival Capone Gang stormed out of a car and rushed them, guns drawn. Spotting the enemy, Weiss and Drucci dove for the safety of a parked car, and, drawing their guns from their shoulder holsters, started returning fire. The area was choked at the moment with morning rush hour pedestrians. One bystander went down in the first volley, while scores of other citizens either ducked for cover or else stood frozen in horror.
Weiss wisely started to fall back, car to car, but Schemer Drucci, often referred to by Capone as "the bedbug," lived up to that sobriquet by charging right at his attackers. The frightened Capone gunmen backed off to a sedan parked on the other side of the avenue and then drove off, with a cursing Drucci firing after them. Drucci jumped on the running board of a passing car, jammed his weapon to the driver's temple and ordered, "Follow that goddamn car." Just then a police flivver arrived, and officers wrestled the crazed Drucci to the pavement.
Questioned by police, Drucci denied there was any gang battle at all, just a case of some punks "trying for my roll"; he flashed a roll of $13,500. The cops brought in Louis Barko, a Capone hood, who had been recognized as one of the gunners, but Drucci followed the underworld code and said, "I never seen him before." Barko and several other suspects were released.
None of the ensuing publicity convinced either gang that they did not have more right to the area than the citizens of Chicago. On August 15, five days after the first battle, Weiss and Drucci were again attacked at virtually the same spot. They were driving in a sedan when gangsters in another car blazed away at them. The North Siders' car was riddled with bullets, but miraculously neither Weiss nor Drucci was hit. They jumped from their car and made it to the sanctuary of the Standard Oil Building, firing back over their shoulders.
On September 20, the O'Banion Gang made a famous counterattack by striking at the Capone headquarters at the Hawthorne Inn in Cicero. A convoy of eight cars filled with gunmen drove slowly past the establishment, and unloaded an estimated 1,000 slugs in an unsuccessful effort to kill Al Capone. All they managed to do was nick a few pedestrians and hit Louis Barko in the shoulder inside the Hawthorne Inn. Later, the police arrested Drucci on suspicion that he had fired the shots that downed Barko. Barko, commenting on Drucci, said, "Never saw him before." Apparently he didn't even remember being brought before Drucci after the first Standard Oil shootout.
The outrage about the shootings was enormous, but nothing much came of it all. One sage said that
somebody
should have at least been saddled with a good stiff fine. But then again this was Chicago, "a goddamn crazy place."
StandIn: Mafia substitute
The mob has often used "front men" and "standins" to take the rap for crimes committed by more important bigwigs. For example, it is considered necessaryand even properthat Mafia rackets, such as gambling operations, take a hit once in a while to give the police, who may be providing protection, some credibility. But few important mafiosi relish the idea of going into a lockup and being mixed with common riff-raff.
A solution is offered by the "standin." Mafiosi bosses or capos enlist a "standin" to take the bust. He goes to the lock-up, is accused of being the racketeer involved and so on. If need be, the standin takes the rap and goes to jail in a conviction. In return, the standin receives payment in cash, or the promise of a more important place in the mob afterward, or both. Occasionally, when an important mobster is grabbed before
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arrangements can be made, the fix is put on later. The standin takes over for the real criminal immediately after the first arraignment, even standing trial, and if found guilty, doing the time.
StandUp Guy: Hobster who won't "talk"
In the argot of the Mafia, it is a great compliment to be called a "standup guy," one who stands up to considerable pressure and threats from law enforcement officials and refuses to turn stool pigeon.
The Witness Protection Program is and has been loaded with fugitives who fall short of "standup guy": Joe Valachi, Vinnie Teresa and Jimmy Fratianno, for example. In fact, almost all mafiosi doing time can win leniency if they talk, but many have refused. This does not always reflect strength of character but, as in Peter Joseph Salerno's case, the fear of mob retribution against themselves or members of their family.
Peter Joseph Salerno had every intention of being a standup guy. A professional jewel thief, he came to have close contacts with the Genovese crime family. However, Salerno began to believe that when in doubt the mob will kill a potential stool pigeon. He was in Atlanta (like Joe Valachi) when he learned there was a contract out on him, and he decided to turn, becoming one of the federal government's most reliable witnesses against the Mafia and on whose head is posted $100,000.
Probably the highest-ranking standup guy in syndicate history was Louis Lepke, the labor racketeer and boss of Murder, Inc., who became in 1944 the only top-level crime executive before or since to be executed. Lepke was known to have information concerning high political and union officials, and his revelations would probably have put Governor Thomas E. Dewey in the White House. The speculation is that Dewey wanted not only a labor official (allegedly Sidney Hillman who was very close to President Franklin D. Roosevelt), but also the crime bosses as well. On the day of his execution, Lepke had his wife read a statement he had dictated in his death cell:
I am anxious to have it clearly understood that I did not offer to talk and give information in exchange for any promise of commutation of my death sentence. I did not ask for that! [Lepke himself inserted the exclamation point.] ... The one and only thing I have asked for is to have a commission appointed to examine the facts. If that examination does not show that I am not guilty, I am willing to go to the chair, regardless of what information I have given or can give.
Obviously the phrase "information I have given" meant Lepke had talked some, but, by using his wife to make the announcement, it was clear he was signaling the syndicate that he was not talking about the crime cartel. He was talking only about politicians and labor people, which the syndicate would tolerate so long as he did not reveal information about the mob. By using his wife as a spokesperson, he was telling the boys he realized no member of his family would be safe if the crime leaders thought he was talking about the organization.
What Lepke couldn't grasp was that Dewey, whatever his desires and ambitions, could not possibly accept a deal that delivered political figures, his electoral enemies, but let every important crime leader in the countryLuciano, Lansky, Anastasia, Siegel, Costello, Adonis, Lucchese and many othersoff the hook.
As a result, Louis Lepke went to the chaira standup guy.
State Street Crap Game
The importance of gambling to the Mafia cannot be overestimated. It provides the mob with the money and power to set up other operations that the public finds less wholesome such as narcotics dealing and murder.
A case in point, Brooklyn's State Street Crap Game, operated by the mob in the 1930s, financed Murder, Inc., the official mob extermination branch. The game was run in a building just off the busy corner of State and Court Streets in downtown Brooklyn. It was for high rollers, attracting wealthy businessmen, and, at times, even police brass and politicianswho suffered big losses and ended up beholden to the gangsters.
Abe Reles, together with Pittsburgh Phil Strauss, one of the two most important hit men of Murder, Inc., was designated by crime bosses Louis Lepke and Albert Anastasia to be the official shylock of the game. Reles's underlings would move among the players, wads of money at the ready, making loans at a trifling 20 percent interestper week. (Mob hit men are seldom if ever paid for any particular murder, but are usually put on a sort of retainer, often consisting of exclusive rights to a certain racket, such as gambling.)
The play per night at the State Street game was usually in excess of $100,000, and Reles's nightly profit from the shylock operation was, by his own estimate, anywhere from $1,000 to $2,000. And the businessmencompulsive gamblers who ended up paying huge amounts of "or else" interestnever realized they were footing the bill for murder.
When Reles turned stool pigeon concerning Murder, Inc., operations, the authorities cracked down on the State Street game with a subsequent big loss to the mob. However, gambling is the easiest racket to get started anew and with the public, the politicians, the police

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