Author: Nicholas Pileggi
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1504041623
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 275
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Book Description
The true story behind the Martin Scorsese film: A “riveting . . . account of how organized crime looted the casinos they controlled” (Kirkus Reviews). Focusing on Chicago bookie Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal and his partner, Anthony Spilotro, and drawing on extensive, in-depth interviews, the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of the Mafia classic Wiseguy—basis for the film Goodfellas—Nicholas Pileggi reveals how the pair worked together to oversee Las Vegas casino operations for the mob. He unearths how Teamster pension funds were used to take control of the Stardust and Tropicana and how Spilotro simultaneously ran a crew of jewel thieves nicknamed the “Hole in the Wall Gang.” For years, these gangsters kept a stranglehold on Sin City’s brightly lit nightspots, skimming millions in cash for their bosses. But the elaborate scheme began to crumble when Rosenthal’s disproportionate ambitions drove him to make mistakes. Spilotro made an error of his own, falling for his partner’s wife, a troubled showgirl named Geri. It would all lead to betrayal, a wide-ranging FBI investigation, multiple convictions, and the end of the Mafia’s longstanding grip on the multibillion-dollar gaming oasis in the midst of the Nevada desert. Casino is a journey into 1970s Las Vegas and a riveting nonfiction account of the world portrayed in the Martin Scorsese film of the same name, starring Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci, and Sharon Stone. A story of adultery, murder, infighting, and revenge, this “fascinating true-crime Mob history” is a high-stakes page-turner (Booklist).
Author: William Donati
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786493437
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 305
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Book Description
Charley "Lucky" Luciano was instrumental to the development of the American Mafia and supervised the attempt to dominate prostitution in New York City. Not surprisingly, he has been the subject of numerous biographies, exposes, and various works of urban folklore since his death in 1962. This book takes scholarship on Luciano to a new level, using fresh research on the investigation, arrest, and conviction of Lucky Luciano to delve deep into the sexual and criminal underworld of New York City. Topics include the complex structure of the New York City bordellos and the takeover that resulted in Luciano's 1936 arrest; his considerable role in the expansion of the international heroin trade; and the shocking attempt to sexually frame a member of prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey's staff in a desperate bid to overturn Luciano's conviction.
Author: Mark W. Curran
Publisher: Nmd Books
ISBN: 9781936828685
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 198
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Book Description
Research journalist Mark W. Curran tells the story of how organized crime built the town of Las Vegas into the glittering mecca it is today. Learn how the mob built the most dazzling and decadent city in the West before being dismantled by federal prosecutors hell-bent on taking them down. Through archival photos and first hand accounts from those who participated, American Mafia: Las Vegas takes you inside the story from the people who know it best. Based on the documentary 'American Mafia: The Rise and Fall of Organized Crime In Las Vegas' Interviews Featuring: Larry Henry - Broadcast Journalist/Columnist 'The Mafia Chronicles' Jeffrey Burbank - Author 'Las Vegas Babylon'/The Washington Post Gary Jenkins - Crime Investigator/Mafia Expert/Host of Gangland Wire Michael Green - Asst. Professor of History - University of Nevada, Las Vegas Dr. J. Michael Niotta, PhD. - Author/Crime Historian/Mob Authority Eric Dezenhal - Author 'The Devil Himself'/Mafia Crime Historian
Author: Al W Moe
Publisher: Al W Moe
ISBN: 1483955559
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 187
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Book Description
Las Vegas was the Mob's greatest venture and most spectacular success, and through 40 years of frenzy, murder, deceit, scams, and skimming, the FBI listened on phone taps and did virtually nothing to stop the fun. This is the truth about the Mob's control of the casinos in Vegas like you've never heard it before, from start to finish. Two of the nation's most powerful crime family bosses went to prison in the 1930's: Al Capone and Lucky Luciano. Frank Nitti took over the Chicago Outfit, while Frank Costello ran things for the Luciano Family. Both men were influenced by their bosses from prison, and both sent enough gangsters into the streets to influence loan sharking, extortion, union control, and drug sales. Bugsy Siegel worked for both groups, handling a string of murders and opening up gaming on the west coast, and that included Las Vegas, an oasis of sin in the middle of the desert - and it was legal. Most of it. The FBI watched as the Mob took control of casino after casino, killed off the competition, and stole enough money to bribe their way to respectability back home. By the 1950's, nearly every major crime family had a stake in a Las Vegas casino. Some did better than others. Casino owners watched-over their profits while competing crime families eyed each other's success like jealous lovers. Murder often followed.
Author: Steve Fischer
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781606710760
Category : Casinos
Languages : en
Pages : 225
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Book Description
Author: Dennis N. Griffin
Publisher: Huntington Press Inc
ISBN: 0929712455
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 309
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Book Description
From burglary to armed robbery and murder, infamous bad guy Frank Cullotta not only did it all, in Cullotta he admits to it -- and in graphic detail. This no-holds-barred biography chronicles the life of a career criminal who started out as a thug on the streets of Chicago and became a trusted lieutenant in Tony Spilotro's gang of organised lawbreakers in Las Vegas. Cullotta's was a world of high-profile heists, street muscle, and information -- lots of it -- about many of the FBI's most wanted. In the end, that information was his ticket out of crime, as he turned government witness and became one of a handful of mob insiders to enter the Witness Protection Program.
Author: Dennis Griffin
Publisher: Wildblue Press
ISBN: 9781942266952
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 232
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Book Description
The Chicago organized crime family known as the 'Outfit' dates back to the reign of the infamous Al Capone and prohibition. As the years passed and prohibition was repealed, Outfit bosses had to adapt and seek new ways to make money illegally. One of those was the expanding gambling and entertainment oasis in the desert: Las Vegas. A lot of cash passed through the Vegas casinos and the mobsters devised a way to get some of it, using a process that came to be known as 'the skim.' To protect their interests, the Outfit sent an enforcer to Sin City in 1971 He was to make sure their casino operations ran smoothly and deal with interlopers, employees who were skimming the skim and other troublemakers, by any means necessary. His name was Tony Spilotro. To help him run his empire Tony imported several heavies from Chicago. Among them was his childhood friend Frank Cullotta, who would function as Tony's street lieutenant. His assignment was to assemble a crew of thieves, arsonists and killers to provide muscle for Tony as necessary, and carry out lucrative burglaries that Tony brought to their attention. Frank and his crew were dubbed by the news media as the Hole in the Wall Gang. The Spilotro era in Vegas was dramatized in the 1995 blockbuster movie Casino, in which Joe Pesci played a character based on Spilotro. Character actor Frank Vincent played 'Frankie' based on Frank Cullotta. The real Frank Cullotta was a technical consultant to the film and appeared in several scenes as a hit man. As screenwriter Nick Pileggi said, 'Without Frank Cullotta there would have been no Casino.' In 'The Rise and Fall' of Tony Spilotro, Frank tells the true story of Tony Spilotro, his rise up the ladder to become an Outfit boss, his subsequent fall from power and murder at the hands of the Outfit. Frank also talks about the many murders Tony committed, ordered or planned. In several instances Frank names the killers in cases that are officially unsolved. It's a story that only Frank Cullotta could tell.
Author: Selwyn Raab
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1429907983
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 810
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Book Description
The New York Times bestseller chronicling the history of NYC’s infamous five mafia families is now the basis for the upcoming The HISTORY® Channel documentary series American Godfathers: The Five Families. Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo and Lucchese. For decades these Five Families ruled New York and built the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) into an underworld empire. Today, the Mafia is an endangered species, battered and beleaguered by aggressive investigators, incompetent leadership, betrayals and generational changes that produced violent and unreliable leaders and recruits. A twenty year assault against the five families in particular blossomed into the most successful law enforcement campaign of the last century. Selwyn Raab's Five Families is the vivid story of the rise and fall of New York's premier dons from Lucky Luciano to Paul Castellano to John Gotti and more. The book also brings the reader right up to the possible resurgence of the Mafia as the FBI and local law enforcement agencies turn their attention to homeland security and away from organized crime.
Author: Jeffrey Sussman
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1538134055
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 237
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Book Description
The great founding figures of organized crime in the 20th century were born and bred in New York City, and the city was the basis of their operations. Beginning with Prohibition and going on through many illegal activities the mob became a major force and its tentacles reached into virtually every enterprise, whether legal or illegal: gambling, boxing, labor racketeering, stock fraud, illegal unions, prostitution, food service, garment manufacturing, construction, loan sharking, hijacking, extortion, trucking, drug dealing – you name it the mob controlled it. The men who organized crime in America were the sons of poor immigrants. They were hungry for success and would use whatever means available to achieve their goals. They were not interested in religious identity and ethnic identity. Their syndicate of criminals was made up, primarily of Italians and Jews, but also Irish and black gangsters who could further their ambitions. Their sole objective was always the same – money. It began with Arnold Rothstein, who not only helped to fix the 1919 World Series, but who also mentored and financed the individuals who would control organized crime for decades. Individuals such as Frank Costello, Lucky Luciano, Bugsy Siegel, Joe Adonis, and Meyer Lansky, who would then follow suit setting up other criminal organizations. They established rules of governance, making millions of dollars for themselves and their cohorts. All the organized crime bosses and their cohorts had the same modus operandi: they were far-seeing opportunists who took advantage of every illegal opportunity that came their way for making money. Big Apple Gangsters: The Rise and Decline of the Mob in New York reveals just how influential the mob in New York City was during the 20th century. Jeffrey Sussman entertainingly digs into the origins of organized crime in the 20th century by looking at the corporate activity that dominated this one city and how these entrepreneurial bosses supported successful criminal enterprises in other cities. He also profiles many of the colorful gangsters who followed in the footsteps of gangland’s original founders. Throughout the book Sussman provides fascinating portraits of a who’s who of gangland. His narrative moves excitingly and entertainingly through the pivotal events and history of organized crime, explaining the birth, growth, maturation, and decline of various illegal enterprises in New York. He also profiles those who prosecuted the mob and won significant verdicts that ended many careers, responsible for bringing many organized crime figures to their knees and then delivering a series of coups de grace – such as Burton Turkus, Thomas Dewey, Robert Kennedy, and Rudolph Giuliani.
Author: Marc Mappen
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 0813561167
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 280
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Book Description
Master story teller Marc Mappen applies a generational perspective to the gangsters of the Prohibition era—men born in the quarter century span from 1880 to 1905—who came to power with the Eighteenth Amendment. On January 16, 1920, the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution went into effect in the United States, “outlawing the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors.” A group of young criminals from immigrant backgrounds in cities around the nation stepped forward to disobey the law of the land in order to provide alcohol to thirsty Americans. Today the names of these young men—Al Capone, Lucky Luciano, Dutch Schultz, Legs Diamond, Nucky Johnson—are more familiar than ever, thanks in part to such cable programs as Boardwalk Empire. Here, Mappen strips way the many myths and legends from television and movies to describe the lives these gangsters lived and the battles they fought. Placing their criminal activities within the context of the issues facing the nation, from the Great Depression, government crackdowns, and politics to sexual morality, immigration, and ethnicity, he also recounts what befell this villainous group as the decades unwound. Making use of FBI and other government files, trial transcripts, and the latest scholarship, the book provides a lively narrative of shootouts, car chases, courtroom clashes, wire tapping, and rub-outs in the roaring 1920s, the Depression of the 1930s, and beyond. Mappen asserts that Prohibition changed organized crime in America. Although their activities were mercenary and violent, and they often sought to kill one another, the Prohibition generation built partnerships, assigned territories, and negotiated treaties, however short lived. They were able to transform the loosely associated gangs of the pre-Prohibition era into sophisticated, complex syndicates. In doing so, they inspired an enduring icon—the gangster—in American popular culture and demonstrated the nation’s ideals of innovation and initiative. View a three minute video of Marc Mappen speaking about Prohibition Gangsters.
