Chicago Mob 1978 Essay Research Paper Chicago

Chicago Mob 1978 Essay, Research Paper

Chicago 1978

This paper examines the goings-on of the Outfit in Chicago in the year 1978. The overriding theme of the year seemed to be the Chicago outfit s connection with Las Vegas. This connection seems to come up over and over in the articles I read. This was also the year James T. Jimmy the Weasel Fratianno become a FBI informer. I will give a sample of what was going on in Chicago each month of the year 1978.

Not all that much happened in January of 1978 according to the newspaper. The article that I came up with dealt with phony ID cards that were for sale. The article says it is startling to find that they (Las Vegas) were apparently ignorant of a phony identification card racket that had its office in that city and advertised all over the country. The article claims that the appearance of a Tribune article on this subject helped the Las Vegas officials learn of the Computer Security Card Co. They closed it down and arrested the man who ran it.

February of 1978 was quite a bit more eventful in the scheme of things. First off there was the killing of five burglars who may have been killed after trying to independently fence stolen goods in Las Vegas. These men probably were killed because they lacked a mob license to steal. The men were Vincent Moretti, Donald Swanson, Bernard Ryan, Steve Garcia, and John Mendell. These men were all suspects in the $1 million dollar theft of jewels, furs, and cash from Levinson s.

The next big event was Jimmy the Weasel telling a jury about 20 gangland killings. This was brought about because Fratianno learned he was implicated in a bombing death of Daniel J. Greene. He feared he could go to prison for his role in the bombing and decided to cooperate with the feds. Among the killings that he talked about was the murder of Frank the Bomp Bompensiero, who was gunned down in February of 1977. After Bompensiero s death it was disclosed that he was a FBI informant. It is believed the series of killings, the .22-caliber murders was ordered by gangland chieftains against FBI informants. Among the murders that fit the pattern was the killing of Sam Momo Giancana the Chicago mob boss. The last time Fratianno s name was of interest to the feds was in 1967. A half-million-dollar loan was obtained by Frank LaPorte through a South Side bank in behalf of Fratianno s trucking company in Sacramento, California. That money was thought to be used to set up the loan shark operation in the Imperial Valley of southern California. Within the last year (of the article) Fratianno had been seen frequently in Phoenix, Arizona conferring with overseers of the mob s gambling and prostitution interests.

March of 1978 was a sparse month for information about the mob. The one important article dealt with mobsters who offered to sell A-bomb fuel. For sale was two tons of nuclear bomb grade uranium. The negotiations with officials, undercover federal agents, who were trying to buy the material, fell through. The author does not know if the mobsters really even had the material or if it was just a hoax. The NRC at first denied that it was possible for this much uranium to be stolen from one of their facilities. They later changed their testimony and admitted that such thefts were in fact possible.

Another article from March dealt with The Myth of the Italian Mafia . In this article Andrew Greeley denies the existence of an Italian Mafia. Greeley says, The Mafia doesn t exist: neither does the Cosa Nostra, the crime syndicate, or even organized crime. The national crime empire is a figment of the imagination of the mass media and an anti-Italian ethnic slur to boot. I m Serous. He goes on to question the validity of the gangland war of 1930-31 in which Salvatore Maranzano was killed. This war may have saw anywhere from 40-60 deaths, and Greeley purports that maybe 5 people (4 in New York and 1 in Pittsburgh) were killed in it. He says, America needs demons and the Mafia is a superb demon even if it does not and never did exist as an organized national conspiracy . This man truly is the epitome of na vet . He is obviously a deluded man who is trying to push his delusions on his audience.

April brought to spotlight the corruption of unions in Chicago. A justice department official charged that corruption in Chicago labor unions was among the worst in the country . The article concentrated on three unions: Laborers International Union, Hotel, Restaurant Employees and Bartenders Union and the Teamsters union.

Also in April was the trial of Harry The Hook Aleman. A reputed mob hit man who in his last trial was let off by Judge Frank J. Wilson in a bench trial. This trial was a jury trial for the charges of racketeering and conspiracy to commit racketeering. Testifying against Aleman was Louis Almeida, a confessed criminal. The article did not specify whether or not Aleman was convicted of the charges. Aleman, born in 1939, is a nephew of the late Outfit boss Joe Ferriola. Aleman is believed to be responsible for at least fifteen homicides. A small man-five eight, 145 pounds, with a fearsome reputation. It was later found that the judge on the bench trail had taken a $10,000 bribe to fix the case. (Abadinsky 176)

April also had an article on the congressional hearings on the infiltration of labor unions by organized crime and the battle to clean up the corru