The Mafia Encyclopedia (96 page)

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Authors: Carl Sifakis

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Page 279
that Chicago was the city of the fix and always spent the money required to cool the ardor of policemen, prosecutors and judges.
He graduated from street mugging to a form of journalism as a slugger for Maxie Annenberg, Moe Annenberg's brother. Maxie at the time was in charge of promoting sales of the Chicago
Tribune
, and O'Banion was used mainly to bop newsdealers to convince them that the
Trib
was not only the world's greatest newspaper but for their purposes Chicago's
only
newspaper. Later on O'Banion transferred his loyalties to the newer Hearst papers in town. At the same time O'Banion learned the safecracking art under one of the racket's foremost practitioners, Charlie "the Ox" Reiser. From Reiser he learned the theory that convictions were impossible without witnesses and dead witnesses made for terrible testimony. It didn't always come to that. On one occasion an executive of Hearst's
American
put up $5,000 bail to secure his release on a safecracking charge. There were newspapers to sell, after all.
By the time Prohibition came, and with it the enormous new opportunities for criminals, O'Banion was the leader of a mighty gang on the North Side. Among the senior members were Bugs Moran, Hymie Weiss, Schemer Drucci (the only Italian O'Banion ever trusted and vice versa), Dapper Dan McCarthy, Two-Gun Alterie and Frank Gusenberg. The O'Banions, almost completely Irish in lower-level manpower, formed an alliance with many Jewish gangsters of the old 20th Ward, especially those working with Nails Morton, and the gangs more or less merged. When Morton was killed in a horseback riding accident, the grief-stricken O'Banions exacted the proper underworld revenge by executing the horse.
O'Banion's approach to Prohibition, even before it went into effect, was to stockpile supplies by hijacking booze from legitimate sources. He tried to continue the same method when the 18th Amendment became effective. "Let Johnny Torrio make the stuff," he was quoted. "I'll steal what I want of it." However, even a consummate thief like O'Banion could not steal enough to meet the needs on the North Side, and he started taking over some of the area's top breweries and distilleries.
This switch in tactics removed a major source of conflict between the Torrio-Capone mob and the North Siders, although Torrio and Capone were deeply upset that O'Banion would not let them operate whorehouses in the North Side, which would have added millions to their income. Deanie's religious inclinations simply would not allow dealing in bodiesalthough he seemed totally untroubled about filling bodies with lead. Still, if they won O'Banion's forbearance about hijacking, Torrio was more than content to let the Irish keep the North Side.
Dion O'Banion was a doting bridegroom and husband who spent his
evenings at home when not out committing homicide.
Torrio was more concerned with syndicating the booze and other rackets in the city so that the various elements could function without harassment from other gangs. Given the makeup of the various gangs, the concept in at least some cases bordered on the utopian. In the first place O'Banion couldn't give up hijacking booze forever; the principles of stealing were too strongly ingrained in him. Then too the Terrible Gennas could not be controlled. A murderous Sicilian family, they had organized moonshining in Little Italy into a veritable cottage industry, with the manufacturing of bathtub booze the chief source of income for many families. Since such rotgut was produced so cheaply, the Gennas could and did invade other areas and undersell other bootleg gangs.
O'Banion for one was not going to stand for that. Neither would Torrio. The O'Banions and the Gennas believed in direct action and warred on each other. Torrio, more cunning than either of them, solved his problems by secretly helping Gennas knock off O'Banions and O'Banions knock off Gennas.
Then O'Banion pulled a swindle that victimized Torrio and caused him to lose face in the underworld. He
Page 280
informed Torrio he was quitting the rackets and was heading West as soon as he could sell off an illegal brewery for a half-million dollars. Torrio jumped at this opportunity to be rid of the unpredictable O'Banion and eagerly put up the money. Almost instantly after the deal was closed and Torrio took possession, federal agents swooped down and seized the brewery and charged Torrio with violation of the Prohibition law. Torrio discovered O'Banion had learned in advance of the upcoming raid and dumped off the property on Torrio. Even when Hymie Weiss, O'Banion's loyal lieutenant, urged him to make amends to Torrio, the gang chief rejoiced contemptuously, "Oh, to hell with them Sicilians."
Now all-out war was inevitable although Mike Merlo, a power in politics and the head of Unione Sicilana, the now bootlegger-corrupted fraternal organization, kept the peace for a time. Then in November Merlo died of natural causes and Torrio was free to act. O'Banion knew an attack was coming but figured his enemies would wait until Merlo was in the ground. He was wrong.
Deanie ran a florist shop on North State Street, directly opposite the church where he had once been a choir boy. The place was partly a dodge to provide him with a legitimate front, but it also satisfied his love for flowers. And O'Banion got a perverse joy out of making a small fortune from selling his blooms for the many gangland funerals. He did a land-office business for the Merlo affair, some of his creations selling for thousands of dollars. On the evening of November 9, he got a special order by telephone for a custom wreath to be picked up the following morning. At the appointed time three men appeared. "Hello, boys," O'Banion greeted them. "You from Mike Merlo's?"
The man in the middle nodded and grabbed O'Banion in a firm handshake. It was an old trick but O'Banion, given the solemnity of the occasion, fell for it. He could not escape the handshake and reach the guns he had on him at the time. The other two men pulled out guns and started firing. O'Banion took a bullet in each cheek, two through the throat at the larynx, and two in the right breast.
They gave O'Banion one of the most flower-bedecked funerals Chicago had ever seen. Naturally the murder was never officially solved, although the killers were later identified as Albert Anselmi and John Scalise. The handshaker was Frankie Yale, a big-shot gangster imported from New York especially for the job by Torrio and Capone.
The death of Deanie did not end the war, as the remaining O'Banions sought savage revenge for their chief's death. Weiss and Drucci who in turn succeeded to leadership met lead-filled ends, and Johnny Torrio as well was nearly assassinated. Recovering from his near-fatal wounds, Torrio decided he'd had enough of Chicago and retired back to Brooklyn, taking $30 million with him in consolation. In the meantime Capone took charge and continued the war to win control of Chicago, masterminding the infamous St. Valentine's Day Massacre which wiped out all the top North Siders except for Bugs Moran.
The importance of the fight with the O'Banions was that it kept Capone off-balance for years. He too thought of organizing crime nationally, but, unable to do what had to be done in Chicago, he was forced to leave that promising field open for the New York mobs under Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky.
O'Brien, John Patrick (18731951): New York mayor
Following the resignation of the corrupt if charming Jimmy Walker, John P. O'Brien was elected to serve out the remaining year of the mayoral term. It was a stunning victory for organized crime.
O'Brien, known for his mediocre talents as a surrogate court judge and his unswerving loyalty to Tammany Hall, was clearly under the thumb of two Tammany leaders, James J. Hines (then controlled by mobster Dutch Schultz, a member of the new Luciano-Lansky national crime syndicate) and Albert C. Marinelli (then directly dominated by Lucky Luciano). When reporters inquired if the mayor was going to name a new police commissioner, he said, "I haven't had any word on that yet."
In 1933, O'Brien was succeeded by Fiorello La Guardia, and underworld payoffs to the police commissioner's officeduring the reign of the supposedly reputable Grover Whalen it came to $20,000 a week delivered in a plain brown bagceased. Under La Guardia's first police commissioner, Major General John J. O'Ryan, who served briefly, and the incorruptible Lewis J. Valentine, who held the post for almost 11 years, the police department was to have its longest run of honesty in the city's history.
O'Connor's Gunners: Chicago police machine-gunning unit
In 1927, William O'Connor, the new chief of detectives in Chicago, went out on a limb. Gang wars were terrorizing the city, but the press and his constituents were unconvinced that O'Connor could stop the shooting. What the situation called for, Chief O'Connor decidedand convinced corrupt Mayor Big Bill Thompson was necessarywas an elite unit, an armored car force that could match the gangsters bullet for bullet.
Page 281
O'Connor picked volunteers from the police force who had fought in the war in Europe and could handle a machine gun. To this squad of super-armed men, he issued an order of almost unparalleled irresponsibility:
Men, the war is on. We've got to show that society and the police department, and not a bunch of dirty rats, are running this town. It is the wish of the people of Chicago that you hunt these criminals down and kill them without mercy. Your cars are equipped with machine guns and you will meet the enemies of society on equal terms. See to it that they don't have you pushing up daisies. Make them push up daisies. Shoot first and shoot to kill. If you kill a notorious feudist, you will get a handsome reward and win promotion. If you meet a car containing bandits, pursue them and fire. When I arrive on the scene, my hopes will be fulfilled if you have shot off the top of their car and killed every criminal inside it.
There was considerable hesitation by many persons to accept such a shoot-first-think-afterward program; they worried about innocent bystanders being cut down in the crossfire. However, such worries by members of the publicand, perhaps, by the gangsters themselvesproved unnecessary. O'Connor's Gunners turned out to be regular johnnies-come-lately to crime scenes, hardly ever turning up in the right place at the right time.
Omerta: Mafia rule of silence
Translated simply
omerta
means ''manliness." It is not manly to be an informer, to tattle to the law or outsiders.
Omerta is often thought to apply only to the upper echelon of organized crime. Yet these ranks inform regularlywhen it suits their purpose. However, the code of silence is enforced with regard to underlings. A man who sings or squeals is a rat. Rats get killed. Thus many a bullet-riddled hood dies coughing up blood but refusing to tell the law who has gunned him down. Underworld underlings are required to go like "men" and rely on their colleagues to avenge their deaths.
There is a reason besides self-preservation that causes Mafia leaders to enforce omerta. When hoods refuse to talk, it is a way of telling victims and witnesses that they too are bound by omerta. If they talk, they can expect the same end.
Omerta goes back to the birth of the Mafia in Sicily in the 13th century when the Mafia was organized to drive out the Spanish invaders. As the Mafia turned criminal, it did precisely what the Spanish had doneterrorize the people, hire out to large landowners who wanted to cow the farmers. The Mafia was ready to kill and it was protected by the code of omerta.
The rule of silence, the real power of omerta that the Mafia brought to America, sealed the lips of victims and witnesses. Going to the police was the cardinal sin. Hapless immigrants could do nothing but silently accept the terror of the Mafia and various Black Hand extortionists. A minor violation of omerta could result in a slit tongue; a major violation, a slit throat of either the offender or a member of his family.
Omerta is strictly for victims, witnesses or lowerlevel mafiosi. The higher-ups think nothing of "ratting" to police to get rid of competition. The cops would take care of the competition and the cunning mafiosi stepped in to fill the void. Lower-grade drug dealers involved with the Mafia are stupid if they believe omerta protects them. The Mafia often operates with police protection but realizes it must reward corrupt officers with more than mere money. The police must be allowed to look brave and efficient, so mafiosi feed them a dealer, allowing them to make a spectacular pinch now and then to placate public opinion. And omerta be damned.
Because higher-up mafiosi make a mockery of omerta, the code has virtually collapsed within the Mafia. Because of that the federal government now has close to 1,000 informers, including scores of Mafia men of the Valachi stripe, under its wing. As Vinnie Teresa, one of the most productive informers of all, put it: "But looking back on my life with the Mafia members, I realize now that omertathe codewas just a lot of bullshit."
Onorta: Southern Italian criminal society
It would be a mistake to believe that only the Mafia of Sicily and the Camorra of Naples supplied America with all its Italian criminals. The Onorta Societa (or Society of Honor) did so as well. The Onorta was centered in Calabria in southern Italy, a mountainous and remote province that prior to the 20th century was almost totally insulated from the vitality, revolutionary fervor and dynamism of the northern Italy.
In outlook and organization the Onorta had much in common with the Mafia and Camorra. It relied on extortion and banditry for funds and honored secret rituals and passwords. Calabria remained feudal and agrarian into the 20th century, and the society was family oriented; when one had troubles one called on one's family and friends for aid. There was no concept of loyalty to any state, rather authority was gauged by the family's standing in its community. The dominant families in a Calabrian community ran the local Onorta.
Calabria was an impoverished area. So, despite the power of the Onorta; many of the young banditry followed the immigrant stream to America. Criminals of

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