THE LEGACY
Sources say that both Jimmy LaPietra and Joe LaMantia were frequent visitors of Angelo LaPietra at the prison in Danbury, Connecticut; and with their help, LaPietra was allegedly still able to make all important decisions and also to control all rackets of his own crew. Also some reports say that Jimmy LaPietra somehow found an inside source who was able to smuggle Italian food to his imprisoned brother. In August 1988, 67 year old Angelo LaPietra was caught by prison guards with contraband food in his jail cell and so he was transferred from Connecticut to another prison in Petersburg VA, because of violation of prison disciplinary rules. According to some government sources at the time, even though their boss was imprisoned, still the LaPietra group remained as one of the most powerful and also most violent street crews within the Chicago Outfit.
While being in jail, in March 1989, LaPietra heard about the sudden death of his long time associate Joe Ferriola who in turn died during a heart surgery and this was allegedly a huge loss for the Cicero-South Side faction. Story goes that Ferriola had serious health issues during the past several years but it seems that didn't stop him in the control over his personal crew and also in attending meetings with the Outfit's top leadership. The guy who inherited Ferriola's position as capo for the Cicero crew was Rocky Infelise who was previously described as Ferriola's top lieutenant. Even though he received all of the interests from his predecessor, still its hard to believe that Infelise had the same power to receive jurisdiction over both crews but instead, it is possible that job belonged to the Chinatown capo or LaPietra's brother Jimmy who in turn had more seniority then LaPietra and was also very well respected by all members and associates. In October 1989, investigators labelled both Infelise and Jimmy LaPietra as successors of the late Ferriola and also as prime leaders of the Cicero-South Side crew.
In May 1992, Chinatown heavyweights Jimmy LaPietra, Frank Calabrese and John Monteleone appeared before a federal grand jury regarding the investigations of an alleged Mob involvement in several car bombings and that same year, the government also listed Jimmy LaPietra as member of the Outfit's leading administration. In August 1993 Cicero capo Rocky Infelise was sent to prison together with several of his lieutenants, including Sal DeLaurentis, on racketeering, extortion and murder conspiracy charges. In September 1993, Jimmy LaPietra died of natural causes, although it seems that Jimmy's death didn't cause any type of problem to his own crew mainly because he already had powerful lieutenants who were able to take control over the whole faction, at any given time.
One of those powerful lieutenants was LaPietra's long time associate John Monteleone who in turn succeeded the late Jimmy LaPietra as capo for the Chinatown crew, while Mike Spano Sr. received Rocky Infelise's position as capo for the Cicero crew. The thing was that besides Chinatown, Monteleone also had interests around Cicero, the South Side and north of the Loop and above all, he held more seniority than Spano, thus making him the top level capo for the Cicero-South Side faction. Some government investigations reported that some of Spano's top lieutenants were often seen in Monteleone's company and in fact, same as his imprisoned boss, Monteleone was more of a Cicero guy rather than Chinatown but the problem was that he followed the LaPietras since "day one". Monteleone's crew was divided on two groups, with the first one being allegedly headed by Frank Caruso Jr. who in turn was the son of the late Frank Caruso Sr., and the second group was headed by Frank Calabrese Sr.
During this period the Chicago Outfit was headed by John DiFronzo from the Elmwood Park crew and reports say that both DiFronzo's close associate Joe Andriacchi and Monteleone acted as his messengers for the rest of the Outfit's capos and soldiers. Sometime between 1996 and 1997, DiFronzo allegedly took a step back from the day to day decisions and so he gave his boss position to Monteleone. Sources say that there was allegedly some type of tension between Monteleone and Andriacchi and so DiFronzo somehow managed to keep the peace between the two factions by making Monteleone the Outfit's new boss and Andriacchi his second in command. According to one informant who gave his story years later, the capo of the Cicero crew Mike Spano Sr. allegedly once told him that during this period Monteleone was his boss and was also the boss of the Outfit.
Frank Caruso Jr. became the new capo for the Chinatown crew mainly because back in 1995 Monteleone's other crew boss Calabrese Sr. was indicted on loan sharking and extortion charges and two years later he was sent to 9 years in prison. Caruso's brother, Bruno was the chief of the Chicago District council and was also president of Local 1001, while Caruso Jr. took a job as trustee and assistant manager of the union's $775 million pension fund.
THE OLD BULL IS HOME
In 1997, Angelo LaPietra was released from prison and when the 77-year old returned back to Chicago, his own crew already controlled the whole Chicago crime family. Old man LaPietra was still looked upon as one of the original creators of his Chinatown crew and his ruthless reputation from the old days already preceded him but while in prison, on the outside times were changing fast. Some government sources speculated that LaPietra allegedly took some type of advisory role next to his long time associate Joey Lombardo, who in turn was also released from prison before LaPietra.
Besides that, other reports say that during this period LaPietra was allegedly quite paranoid and refused to talk to anyone within or outside the Outfit. But no matter how paranoid LaPietra was, his own faction currently ruled the Outfit and it is hard to believe that he never met the Outfit's boss who in turn was his personal successor. LaPietra allegedly often sat in the corner of one Oak Lawn restaurant, in which Monteleone often held court, but rarely socialized with the visitors and guests. Anyone who tried to shake hands with LaPietra, the old man would've simply given him or her the so-called "crazy look" and that was it. Since LaPietra was a made man and also former capo for the Outfit, he was probably still receiving income from his own crew and also still lived lavishly at his old fortress in Cicero. By 1998, LaPietra's old associate Monteleone allegedly controlled all video poker and other gambling machines around the Chicago area and also controlled extensive gambling and loan sharking activities, which means that money wasnt a problem at the time.
END OF THE ROAD
In April 1999, Monteleone's predecessor and alleged advisor, Angelo LaPietra died of natural causes at the age of 78. Within the government and around the U.S., LaPietra remained known as a ruthless gangster who mainly loved the action of the so-called "blue collar" rackets which often involved violence, intimidation and murder. LaPietra was always feared and that's why he also became one quite greedy individual by taking almost everything under his jurisdiction. Back in the days he started working for one of the Outfit's most violent district bosses and that's why LaPietra's so-called legacy was also represented by brutal individuals like Monteleone and Frank Calabrese Sr., who also killed people with the blink of an eye. But around the Chicago area, especially within his old neighbourhood, LaPietra remained known as individual who donated lots of cash for the needy and poor, and also as founder of the Old Neighbourhood Italian American Club, and story goes that the Cicero, Chinatown and Bridgeport areas were considered "sacred" by the Outfit and LaPietra's name can still be heard even today. LaPietra was survived by his wife Mildred, a daughter Joann Lascola, a son Angelo Jr., three grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
"LIFE" AFTER DEATH
In 2010, the name of the late Angelo LaPietra managed to hit the front pages of newspapers again. In April that same year, federal agents observed old time member of the Cicero-South Side group Joseph Scalise together with Arthur Rachel and Robert Pullia and during the recording of one of their conversations, the feds stumbled upon another more controversial subject or a bizarre twist, on which the boys planned to execute in near future. The conversation started between Scalise and Pullia and was mostly regarding the recent seizure of huge amounts of cash, jewellery and firearms at the residence of Chicago Outfit big shot Frank Calabrese Sr. They also talked about some previous cases in which some of deceased crime bosses, such as Tony Accardo and Joe Ferriola, had safes in their residences because they did not trust banks. In the end, Scalise mentioned deceased crime boss Angelo LaPietra, who built his own house and allegedly had a safe somewhere in it, and that's when the feds realized that the boys were planning to rob the house of the late Outfit "capo".
In fact, Scalise unknowingly explained to the feds the whole plan. Here's what he said: "From day one, the upstairs windows. 'Cause I remember when he (LaPietra) built that house. The upstairs windows have never been opened. If you can get up there, it will not be alarmed. Art (Rachel) checked out Maggie's (LaPietra's wife) daughter's house, and there are no alarms on the second floor." Then Pullia added: "She spots you over there, fuck 'em. She, she walks in while we are there we will grab it, fuck it, because we'll be masked up anyways. Fuck her. Put the arm on her and walk her back, any alarm goes off we will kill ya." During the conversation, Scalise also showed a small dosage of personal hatred against the late LaPietra by stating: "He was a miserable person…who after his release from prison would sit in a chair in a corner and stare at people. Every little thing made him nuts." So in plain words, they hoped to find a secret stash of jewels and valuables at the residence, which were allegedly stashed by the late LaPietra, and if they were caught by his daughter, their plan was to scare and threaten her at the same time or maybe even kill her. And so instead of chasing them for planning a bank robbery, the feds immediately changed their plans.
On April 5, 2010, somewhere around the morning hours Scalise met with another "friend of his" from the old Cicero crew known as James Inendino, and so and Scalise asked his buddy to find out on who was usually house sitting at the LaPietra residence. Later, Inendino talked to the some people and received information that there was nobody there however in the end Scalise agreed that "there's gotta be somebody there." On April 8, at approximately 8:00 p.m., the trio appeared near the LaPietra residence and engaged in what was believed to be a counter-surveillance driving, like rounding the residence etc. Scalise was behind the wheel and he parked the van on the south side of the house and they all just watched. After that, Scalise said that he could see right in and that the blinds were open on one of the windows and so both Scalise and Pullia quickly got out and went straight to the window which was located on the southwestern corner of the residence and started drilling holes so they could take down the whole window and enter easily.
As the burglars worked on their "task", suddenly dozens of FBI agents and police patrol cars appeared and quickly arrested them. When another group of federal agents arrested Rachel while sitting in the van, he tried to act like he did not know what was going on. He said: "What is this all about?" and one of the agents replied "It's about the house over there", while pointing with his finger in direction of the LaPietra residence. The trio was quickly taken into custody and the day was saved, including the house of the late Angelo LaPietra that was built from the sweat and blood of the ordinary citizen, again thanks to the feds.
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THE ASSASSINATION OF MAYOR CERMAK & THE CHICAGO OUTFIT
In this post I want to talk about one quite old situation, since it is too early for me to say a possible “Mob hit”, which is quite similar to many other “situations” that occurred during the following decades.
There is not much difference between high profile public killings such as the assassination of President Jack Kennedy or the public “hit” on infamous Mafia boss Joe Colombo. Or even the killing of JFK’s brother Robert Kennedy which was also executed in the same style and also it occurred in front of more than few witnesses. In fact, some of these killings occurred in front of thousands of eye witnesses and in most cases, the alleged assassins were killed sooner or later, and on top of that, all cases remain closed but at the same time, there are still many unexplained details or connections regarding the murders, mainly because the assassins had minimal and almost non-existent mob connections.
All of the previously mentioned targets were killed by some type of “strange” and lone gunmen who in some way sacrificed their lives in eliminating publicly some high profile individual, allegedly for their own or personal ideas and reasons. This wasn’t happening only in the U.S., but instead it was, and it’s still happening all over the world. For example, Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar also used similar tactics while eliminating public figures, or Mexico’s AFO cartel or even today’s suicidal Islamic extremists who sacrifice their own lives with the blink of an eye just to eliminate their prime targets.
Obviously these types of killings sometimes were triggered by one single mind who decided to solve the problem in his own way, but some were triggered by a group of people who decided to use some lunatic with crazy ideology and with some social problems, ready to sacrifice his freedom and life. I personally believe that all examples are mainly executed with the help of “Machiavellian” manipulation, followed by massive corruption. Once that happens, it is very hard, almost impossible, to make one whole conclusion on who did what and was there someone else behind the murder, or whether the assassin acted alone.
Well there was one alleged assassination attempt which preceded all of the previously mentioned situations, and in this case the alleged target was the country’s President, which luckily for him remained alive but one famous (or infamous) Mayor, who was also present, received one bullet in his stomach and later died. Since this was a tragedy which occurred decades before the JFK or Colombo assassinations, my personal belief is that there is some similarity in the details of the killings between this one and the rest.
The high profile killing for which I’m talking about involved President Franklin Roosevelt and the alleged “unlucky” Mayor Anton Cermak, and everything occurred in 1933 at Bayfront Park in Miami, Florida in front of hundreds of visitors who came to see their President and everything finished with the fatal wound in the stomach of Chicago’s Mayor Cermak. If we want to solve the case, first we have to look at the four main individuals involved in the situation, one by one, which includes President Roosevelt, Mayor Cermak, one high level Mafia boss and the alleged assassin.
Franklin Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was America’s 32nd President from 1933 until his death in 1945, and according to multiple reports, this guy allegedly had “indirect” Mob ties. Roosevelt was against Tammany Hall and his alleged plan was to neutralize the Tammany influence, which means that he had to go against the Mob. Tammany Hall was sponsored by all of the east coast crime families, including Chicago. The main moment or situation which Roosevelt used to get the gangsters on his side was when one influential member of Roosevelt’s faction, Albert Marinelli first decided to separate himself from the party. Story goes that Marinelli was backed by Genovese boss Charles Luciano and later “someone” forced Marinelli to again join Roosevelt’s group. The mob always, and I mean always used to support both oppositions, no matter if it was about local politics or regarding some election in a different country.
I usually don’t believe much in statements which were allegedly made by some mobsters and then were placed in some book, although years later some of those statements came out to be true. Again, I usually relay on information that comes from wiretapped conversations which according to me are the best evidences but still, here’s one statement allegedly made by Luciano himself and it goes something like “I don’t say we elected Roosevelt, but we gave him a pretty good push”.
Now let’s look at one of Sam Giancana’s alleged statements which can be found in the “Double Cross” book: “Truman owes everything he’s got to us. Pendergast made him judge and then, with the Italian muscle behand him, got him to the Senate. When the 44th election came up, Kelly here in Chicago got him on the ticket with Roosevelt. Shit, Chicago got Roosevelt and Truman nominated and elected. We were good to Roosevelt, he was good to us.”
If we look at Roosevelt’s ally from the Chicago area, Ed Kelly, well this guy had one close political associate since the old days who went by the name of Patrick Nash and their political group was known as the “Kelly-Nash Machine”. Both Kelly and Nash were closely associated with the Jewish faction from the Chicago Outfit which at the time was mainly located around the Lawndale area and was represented by big time gamblers such as Ben Zuckerman, who in turn was closely connected to one Italian capo from the West Side faction known as Lawrence Mangano. By the early 1940’s, Mangano already introduced the Kelly-Nash duo to his prime political representative, James Adducci who in turn was allegedly a made member of Chicago’s Cosa Nostra. On October 6 1943, Patrick Nash died of natural causes, thus leaving both Kelly and Adducci to take complete control.
I personally do not have any evidence showing direct connection between Roosevelt and the U.S. Mob, but there are obviously evidences regarding his political allies from the Pendergast and the Kelly-Nash political machines having deep mob-ties at the time.
Anton Cermak
During the late 1890s, young Anton “Tony” Cermak mostly hung around Chicago’s Southwest Side and began his political career as a simple precinct captain, who by 1902 was elected to the Illinois House of Representatives. It was the time when the original Irish Mob ruled supreme over Chicago’s underworld and controlled all politics, and above all they managed to organize all ethnic criminal groups in one single and huge gambling syndicate with its own criminal commission. The Southwest Side and the areas around the Union Stockyards were mainly ruled by Irish bosses such as “King Mike” McDonald and his longtime associate and protégé James “Big Jim” O’Leary. In fact, since O’Leary belonged to the Irish Mob, he also had huge influence within the Democratic Party with the help of one of his underlings known as Roger Sullivan, who in turn was the head of that same Democratic faction and was always considered as Cermak’s mentor. So it for Sullivan who first gave a job to Cermak as precinct captain, and later placed him in the House of Representatives.
Story goes that Cermak didn’t represent himself as one highly educated individual but instead, he often acted as one quite tough individual, same as his mentors, and wasn’t afraid to use violence and loved being in the company of racketeers on daily basis. There’s nothing surprising in this type of information since the whole political machine in Chicago at the time was financed and also headed by organized crime individuals, and so by the late 1910’s Cermak worked as Alderman for the 12th Ward. In 1922, Cermak was elected as the president of the Cook County Board of Commissioners and later in 1924 he attended the lavish funeral of one political crime boss and head of the Unione Siciliani known as Michele “Mike” Merlo, who in turn was also former boss of Chicago’s Italian Mafia. The late Merlo previously continued the tradition of the old Irish mob by keeping the peace between all ethnic criminal groups and also constantly tried to keep them in one piece or one syndicate, obviously with the help of constant collaborations between those same crews and not crossing each other’s areas.
Back in 1907, the first organized crime boss of Chicago’s underworld and political corruptor, and also “peacemaker” for all gangs, Mike McDonald, died of natural causes and 17 years later or in 1924 Mike Merlo also died, followed by “Big Jim” O`Leary in January 1925, who also died of natural causes. This meant that all of the so-called “peacemakers” who kept the balance within Chicago’s underworld were now dead, and so all hell broke lose. Some gangs remained independent, while many had to chose sides between the most powerful factions, and the same situation was for the politicians too, especially for the ones who were financed and backed by different criminal crews.
Some reports say that two of the prime crime bosses around the Southwest side were Joseph "Polack Joe" Saltis and Frank McErlane. Another criminal faction at the time who also lurked around those same areas, was the John Torrio/Al Capone crew which in turn was in alliance with the rising Italian Mafia.
Story goes that Cermak was some type of racist who allegedly hated most Italians and used foul words whenever he allegedly mentioned some Italian or the population in general. So if the story is true, then it is quite clear on why Cermak backed some of the so-called independed non-Italian gangs such as the Saltis crew which were in conflict with some of the Italian groups at the time. Sources from that period say that the Saltis gang was in conflict with the “Diamond Joe” Esposito clan from the West Side. Joe Esposito was one of the “few” non-Sicilians who were made members of the old U.S. Cosa Nostra.
Besides having the Italian Mafia on his side, Esposito was also allegedly in alliance with the Ralph Sheldon gang from the nearby South Side, but in 1928 Esposito was killed allegedly by his own Italian people, but there is another theory in which non-Italian gangs were allegedly involved in Esposito’s demise. “Coincidentally”, that same year Cermak became the chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party. At the time there was an internal war within Chicago’s underworld regarding two main spots, including the top position in the Italian Unione Siciliani and also regarding the Mayor position of Chicago. So the Italians already had the Mayor spot since the Republican representative William Hale Thompson was on their payroll but regarding the complete control of the Italian organization, a lot of representatives ended up dead, and by 1930 the so-called Capone crew was the most powerful crime organization in Chicago.
During that same year Cermak allegedly made an alliance with one non-Italian and influential racketeer known as Ted Newberry, who in turn used to be a member of the former Dean O’Banion/Vincent Drucci gang and in fact, he was allegedly one the fellas who betrayed and lured their own group by setting up a meeting which later became known as St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. In addition, many researchers say that there was no connection between Cermak and Newberry, but the reports from that same time period regarding their alleged alliance are too overwhelming.
So Newberry became a close associate of Chicago’s Italian Mafia, especially to Salvatore Loverde and Paul Ricca, and story goes that he even received a diamond belt buckle personally from Al Capone himself, regarding his loyalty. Capone used to give that same type of gift to all leaders, both Italian and non-Italian, who decided to betray their bosses and joined the Capone family. In 1930, Newberry was arrested while riding on a train together with Ricca, Loverde, Jake Guzik and Ed Vogel, while being on their way to New York, allegedly to watch a boxing match.
It seems it was up for Newberry to maintain the connection between Cermak and the Italian syndicate, and according to one FBI memo, Cermak allegedly promised the Capone family all rights in operating the lucrative policy racket around Chicago’s South Side, in exchange for him to receive the Italian votes regarding the position as Chicago’s Mayor, and of course a percentage from all of the illegal income. In fact, Cermak’s connection to the Italian syndicate was only out of selfish reasons, something which will end up bad for both Cermak and Chicago’s Italian crime syndicate.
In 1931, Cermak was elected Chicago's 36th Mayor by defeating “Big Bill” Thompson who in turn was also backed by the Italian syndicate, and so Cermak immediately established a Democratic stranglehold in the mayor's office, which quickly built the strength of the Democratic Party by also bringing together old enemies within that same group. Cermak obviously felt powerful and during his whole lifetime he was a very ambitious guy, but maybe too ambitious for a man in his position. As I previously stated that during his political career, Cermak was mostly backed by Irish, Pollack or Slovakian racketeers but above all, his connection to the rising Italian crime syndicate was inevitable.
Since Cermak allegedly hated the Italian population, he possibly waited for the right moment to turn his back on the Capone family, and to takeover their rackets with the help of non-Italian criminal crews. That moment came in 1932 when Capone was imprisoned and was also taken to prison out of Chicago, and so many old enemies tried to take over his criminal empire. And story goes that Ted Newberry was allegedly the one who instantly made an alliance with the rival Roger Touhy crew and some of the African-American crime groups, and decided to take the Capone family out of the gambling racket.
Legend goes that members of the newly created Chicago Outfit, such as Paul Ricca and Charles Fischetti, previously asked for political and police protection from the Cermak administration, regarding their gambling rackets, and it seems that Cermak realized that the Capone family depended on their gambling operations, since it was their next huge financial income, obviously after the end of Prohibition. Newberry allegedly assured Cermak that with their complete control over the policy racket on the South Side, he would become the richest guy in the city of Chicago. Cermak made a plan for “selling” the rights to the previous “owners”, which meant the Jones brothers and the African-American crime syndicates and to simply take out the next-in-line boss of the Capone Mob, which they all thought was Frank Nitto.
Frank Nitto
The thing was that Nitto got out of prison after Capone’s imprisonment and one government investigator mentioned Nitto’s name as possible successor, and so that same statement quickly went national by being on the newspaper headlines for the next 6 or 7 years. Decades later even some less informed Outfit members mentioned Nitto as one of the old time bosses and on top of that they never met him. I have some examples which indicate that many members didn’t know that some of their business associates were also made members, meaning some members didn’t know their “brothers” from their own “brotherhood” or crime family and so no wonder on why some of them gave such info regarding Nitto.
Since they were all wrong, still many rival gangsters and political bosses believed in the information and so in their eyes Nitto was the “real boss” of the Chicago Outfit, and all of the media coverage constantly pushed the false information into everyone’s head. Nitto obviously held some high stature within the Outfit because I have evidence that he, together with his close West Side associate Louis Campagna, were sponsoring new members for the organization which possibly means that Nitto was either a capo or captain of his own crew, or was a representative for the whole West Side faction on the Outfit’s Board of Directors, with Campagna above him or maybe as his second in command.
Whatever is the truth, I have numerous evidences that the real boss of the organization was in fact Capone’s number two guy Felice DeLucia a.k.a. Paul Ricca, who in turn was often seen with bosses from other families during that same time period. Capone was “Best Man” at Ricca’s wedding and as the years passed by, Ricca became the boss’ main “voice” on the east coast and received a nickname such as “Il Comparello” which was allegedly given to him by some of the New York bosses. Also, some researchers say that Campagna was Ricca’s underboss, which brings me again to my previous statement regarding Nitto’s position.
There’s not even a speck of information out there regarding the Chicago Outfit or the U.S. Mob in general wanting to eliminate the country’s President or Chicago’s Mayor during that same time period, which means that the Mob was “busy” fighting for the control over new lucrative rackets and proof for that was their move to make a deal with Cermak regarding the policy racket on the city’s South Side.
This is also a proof that none of the rival non-Italian and political bosses understood the Italian Mafia at the time and its own way of regrouping in their ranks. The Cermak administration obviously becoming a huge problem in the eyes of the rising Italian Mob at the time and the “dark clouds of war” were slowly arriving over the city of Chicago.
The Conflict
As I already stated that in 1932 Frank Nitto was out of prison and so Ted Newberry allegedly made the first move for eliminating his “main” target. Now, for Newberry to make a move against the Capone/Ricca family, first he had to control large crew and also to have high level police and political protection. Newberry didn’t have a large crew, but he obviously had some police, and probably political backing too.
There are still some claims and alleged conclusions that there is no real proof for Cermak being involved in the beginning of the conflict. Well that’s obviously wrong. First of all, the Cermak administration allegedly gave “free-reign” or free pass for some of the police squads to harass and assault certain high profile Chicago gangsters, usually the ones who belonged to the Capone family.
Second, there’s one FBI memo which might be the only proof that Cermak swindled the Outfit regarding the policy racket and gave it to Newberry and the African-American syndicate, which was possibly the main reason for the beginning of the longtime quarrel between the black syndicates and the Outfit regarding that same racket. In fact, the African-American syndicates controlled the policy racket since the late 19th century, and so this was a war between other ethnic groups, with huge political backup, on who was going to control the black man’s racket. Cermak wasn’t interested only in receiving his share from the rackets, but instead he also needed the votes from the huge black population from around the large South Side.
So all of the statements made by other mob historians regarding the Newberry/Cermak alliance being non-existent are not true. We can obviously see that the African-American/Cermak alliance and the swindling of the Outfit were two quite real situations. This means that we can obviously form a conclusion that Cermak possessed deep Mob-connections and as Chicago’s Mayor, he also had the power of having the last word on who was going to illegally run what in his own city, especially in the sphere of the gambling business.
On top of that, at the time Cermak’s daughter was fooling around with one Capone associate known as Otto Kerner, who in turn married her and a decade later became a U.S. States Attorney. So my point is that Cermak possibly was already tied to the Outfit but for some reasons he swindled them and allegedly became their problem. Another interesting info is that after the imprisonment of Al Capone in 1932, two Outfit members Jake Guzik and Murray Humphreys tried to intensify the cultivation of political and police officials, which will be friendlier to the Outfit but obviously Cermak was standing in their way.
This was the moment when Newberry orchestrated a hit by sending two corrupt police detectives so the whole thing would look like a raid and to quickly kill their target right there on the spot and in the end to say that it happened in a self-defense. So on December 19, 1932, in a gangland fashion, two detectives from Chicago’s police squad, Harry Miller and Henry Lang, went to Frank Nitto’s office at 221 N. LaSalle Street, and the duo entered through the door, disarmed the four bodyguards and handcuffed the alleged crime boss. Suddenly detective Lang took a military position and fired five shots into Nitto’s body and quickly after that, the duo left the scene.
Miraculously Nitto managed to survive and slowly recovered in hospital, and that’s when Cermak and Newberry made a huge mistake by thinking that with Nitto out of the picture or “with the head dead, the body dies”, but the problem was that neither the alleged “head” was dead, nor the Capone family was really damaged by the situation.
Obviously none of Capone’s real successors such as Ricca, Frank Rio and Fischetti were that stupid since they were able to find out on who was behind the Nitto assassination attempt with their “eyes closed”. Maybe Newberry didn’t understand the Italian Mafia, but he obviously understood the streets of Chicago and even though Nitto was alive, still Newberry knew that the Capone family were coming after him and so he fled the city. After all, one of the government “hitmen” decided to talk or “spilled the beans” that Nitto was attacked with the intent to be eliminated. So less than a month later, or on January 3, 1933, Newberry was found dead in Indiana, shot by several shotgun blasts.
The Plot
According to some reports from that same decade, after the Newberry murder, Mayor Cermak allegedly was warned several times by government agents and also by Chicago’s police department that he was probably in trouble, since they allegedly noticed that he was being followed by quite suspicious individuals, on daily basis. Story goes that Cermak was also warned by couple of his close political associates that rumors started floating regarding his future assassination but according to one of his close associates, Cermak always said that he was the Mayor and no one will dare to touch him.
Still, in the end Cermak was convinced to buy himself a bullet-proof vest and moved into a different apartment and he even increased the number of his bodyguards, from two to five, and also placed police guards at the homes of his two daughters. This means that after the Newberry murder, the Mayor was obviously fearing for his own life and also for the lives of his loved ones, since he obviously realized the mistake he made and also the dangerous problem in which he was implicated. If there wasn’t any connection between Cermak and Newberry, then why all of the high level security?!
When the cops received all the complaints and secret information that the Mayor’s life was in danger, they quickly began following many known members and associates of the Capone crime family, which at the time was allegedly the only crime syndicate that had the ability and connections to pull off such a “job”. In fact, the Chicago Mafia was known for killing politicians since the 1920s.
I believe that the Mob was quite aware of the danger regarding killing the Mayor on their own ground because it was going to be obvious on who was responsible for the “hit”. So they probably waited for the perfect moment, or in other words, they waited for the Mayor to leave town or to start moving around.
On February 12, 1933, word went out that Cermak was going to Florida and was about to attend the speech of President Franklin Roosevelt in Miami, on February 15, or three days later. Strange “coincidence” occurred when on February 14, or less than 24 hours before the gathering, Capone members and prime hitmen William White and Vincenzo Gibaldi a.k.a. Jack McGurn were arrested at the train station in Chicago, while waiting for their lift to Florida. They were questioned for their plans in Miami and later they were arrested and allegedly held at the police station in Chicago until the next morning or in other words, until the whole thing was finished down in Florida.
Now, McGurn was known to the Chicago police since the mid 1920’s as one high profile killer for the Capone family, and after the St. Valentine’s Day massacre, he was known all around the country. As for “Three Finger” White, I believe that there’s no need to waste any words regrading this fella since he was one of the most notorious individuals within Capone’s Outfit at the time, mainly because White was considered as professional killer, kidnapper and extortionist who killed anyone who stood in his way, including cops. The main point here is that these guy were also good logisticians for orchestrating contract killings.
As I already said that those two guys were known by every cop around the country, especially in Florida since the Chicago mob always had their interests and many guys constantly travelled down there. This means that no Mafia boss would’ve ever placed these two “famous” killers in front of dozens of bodyguards, policemen and secret service agents, and between hundreds of attendees and newspaper men. There was no chance for them to getaway unnoticed by all of those people, and so what was their plan?
Usually, when the Capone family wanted for some high level target to be executed, they used some professional killer from the “outside” or someone who had almost no ties to their organization or as some of the media called them “out-of-town men”. This is something which occurred quite often during the days of Prohibition and it is quite well documented. So again, what were both White and McGurn doing that same day on train station, while waiting for a train to Florida and what was their purpose? They obviously knew that they were constantly followed by the cops and government agents, so what was going on?
Again, according to my long time research on the Chicago Outfit, those guys quite often used assassins who recently came or were brought by some third party from a different city, just to eliminate the problem. You see, when Al Capone came on the scene, the media and newspaper men went crazy about his close associates and members of his crime family, and so they were constantly followed by newspaper men who in turn also took pictures of these fellas, and this was just one of the main reasons for changing their murder logistics. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes they still personally killed each other but when it came to high profile and highly secured targets, they used other tactics.
So the Outfit obviously knew about the huge political gathering and they were also aware of the number of cops on the streets, and so the arrest of both McGurn and White was probably a simple decoy or a diversion for the cops to think that they got the “wannabe” assassins. Neither White nor McGurn weren’t able to arrive in Miami since both of them were locked up for the night on February 14, or the previous day before the political gathering occurred. So I think that I personally can assure you that during this period the Mob quite often used all kinds of alibis, decoys, professional tactics and assassins, just to eliminate their problem. They often used military tactics, huge payoffs and every possible tool for creating their logistics on some particular contract killing. For example, when the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre occurred, the cops found a trail of evidences which led straight to some Outfit guys such as John Moore a.k.a. Claude Maddox but the thing was that he had a strong alibi, meaning he was in court during the shootings. Even the Judge stepped in Maddox’s defense, who later came out to be one of their “puppets” in the judicial system. So this is only a theory but maybe McGurn and White were sitting there on purpose so they can get noticed by the police and get themselves arrested, while the real assassin took the train to Miami or maybe was already there?!
On February 15, among the thirty or more noted political visitors and local leaders on the platform at Bayfront Park in Miami, also present was Mayor Cermak. All of the political leaders who attended the gathering had their own chauffeurs who in turn some also acted as their security guards but the main thing was that President Roosevelt, besides being always followed by his huge security, he was also watched by ten Secret Service men who in turn often followed him when he toured around or out of the country. And on top of that, there were also at least a dozen of Cermak’s personal security guys who carefully watched for any familiar criminal faces in the crowd, who might belong to Chicago’s underworld, something which again proves my previous point regarding Cermak knowing that he was in trouble.
According to several reports, there was so much security at that particular gathering and everyone thought that it was for the President, which means that not even a fly was able to go near the prime political faces. When President Roosevelt arrived in his presidential automobile, suddenly he singled out Mayor Cermak for a greeting and later the President stood on the back seat of his car and spoke briefly to the crowd. There were great cheers and as he finished, and Cermak immediately rose from his seat and stepped to the front of the stand. He leaned over so he can again shake hands with Roosevelt and later the Mayor moved away. While Cermak stood few feet away from the President’s car, there was a startling interruption when allegedly five shots suddenly rang out.
One quite short man, who stood 9 meters from the President, between two or three rows of spectators, began yelling and started shooting with his pistol. The first shot allegedly missed the President who previously quickly slid down under the backseat, but somehow the target continued shooting four more times. As I previously stated that Cermak was 5 or 6 feet away from the President but when the smoke cleared, Cermak had a bullet in his stomach, or below his last rib and also five other individuals, who stood behind him, were also injured. President Roosevelt remained unharmed while Cermak died 19 days later from complications which occurred from the bullet. The assassin was quickly declared as anarchist who missed his original target which was the President, and just twelve days after Cermak’s death, he was executed by the government. The name of the alleged assassin was Giuseppe “Joe” Zangara.
The Assassin
Joe Zangara was a Calabrian immigrant who arrived in the U.S. sometime during the early 1920’s and story goes that previously he served in World War I. Zangara allegedly settled in New Jersey and mainly worked as bricklayer, something which helped him to become a naturalized citizen of the United States back in 1929. By 1933, the whole New Jersey area was infested by all kinds of criminal crews that belonged to some of the New York families, including the Charles Luciano family which in fact was a “older cousin” of the Chicago Outfit.
Reports say that Zangara was allegedly always “obsessed” with a huge urge to kill a King or a President, since throughout his life time he allegedly hated capitalists. Back in those days Italy’s Calabrian criminal clans, such as the infamous Camorra, like all secret societies, they were also a closed sect that acted in the shadows. Story goes that the Neapolitan Camorra has a longer history than any of the other Italian mafias. Some researchers say that the Neapolitan Camorra has Spanish origins and it is possible that the name “Camorra” was “invented” during the times when many poor people were exploited by their aristocratic bosses, whether they belonged to the Spanish rule or capitalists who were in alliance with the Spanish elite. The creation of camorrist gangs also created some type of anarchistic ideology and motives which resulted with constant homicidal violence against the capitalist “system”. Legend goes that the so-called Camorristi sometimes used a knife as some type ritualistic weapon while killing some policeman who in turn previously molested some family or families, or while escaping from prison.
Again, some sources say that the Camorra’s hierarchy was in fact “born” in the local prisons, similar to today’s prison gangs, especially when one Spanish adventurer known as Raimondo Gamur was arrested in Naples and was sent to jail. Legend goes that Gamur later allegedly inspired and taught some of the imprisoned Neapolitans regarding the so-called “Spanish theory” which in fact was a recipe for a secret criminal organization with its own code of conduct, hierarchy of command and bosses. The word “Camorra” was said to be the Neapolitan dialect (idiom) rendering of the surname “Gamur”.
From the late 19th century and throughout the 1900’s and 1910’s, lots of Neapolitan criminals began immigrating to the U.S., including Chicago. During the 1910’s one Neapolitan criminal leader who went by the name of Antonio DeLucia, was charged for some crime and was also labelled as the main individual who allegedly oversaw the “transportation” of Italian criminals to America. In addition, even though it is not 100% confirmed, still it is possible that Antonio DeLucia was possibly the father of future Chicago Outfit boss and former Camorrista, Paul Ricca, who in turn arrived in the U.S. in 1920, while Joe Zangara arrived three years later with his uncle named Vincent Cafaro. I personally don’t have any kind of proof that Zangara had any connections to the Italian Camorra, but I think that I can make a conclusion that Zangara had that same old anarchistic ideology by hating all capitalists and also in keeping his mouth shut, in a fanatic way.
As I previously stated, Mayor Cermak allegedly hated Italians and obviously swindled Chicago’s Italian organization, while being in alliance with a non-Italian gangster. On top of that, during those days the Chicago Outfit was mainly headed by non-Sicilians or so-called “Mainlanders” such as Ricca, Nitto, Campagna, Rio, and the rest of the fellas. So obviously coordinated terrorist activity requires special organization, loyalty and ideological fanaticism, which often goes to the extreme by one sacrificing himself for an ideological cause. These sick individuals usually have a strong need for attention and loyalty, and those who demonstrate loyalty to them and assure them some type of alleged safety, usually end up as mentors and leaders for those same type of mentally sick patients. And Zangara was one of those “sick individuals” who suffered from severe and constant pain in his abdomen and according to Zangara himself, he allegedly attributed his pain to being forced to do strong physical labor on his father's farm back in Italy, because they were very poor.
In some of the video news reports from that time period, we can see Zangara’s relaxed body position and face while answering questions, which in turn were all answered in some kind of cynical style in which he used sentences such as “his a capitalist” and “because my stomach hurts…yeah”. So after reading some of his answers and simple health diagnostics, if you ask me Zangara was the perfect target for easy manipulation. You see, Zangara was a sick man who suffered from serious type of depression and constant hypochondriac thoughts, caused by some organ difficulties and felt a lot of physical pain. In fact, he suffered from adhesions on his gallbladder, which can be often caused by the result of injury during some previous surgery. Or in other words, Zangara was suffering from post-Cholecystectomy Syndrome, which is a symptom that often appears after a gallbladder surgery. Even though it is almost impossible to predict which patient will go on to develop that kind of syndrome, still there are some strong factors that are known to increase the risk following a surgery.
These factors include surgery performed for causes other than confirmed gallbladder disease, also patients with a prior history of irritable bowel syndrome or other chronic intestinal disorders, and in the end patients with a history of certain psychiatric illnesses. In fact, Zangara previously really went through a surgical procedure which allegedly caused his stomach problem and constant pain, but this fella wasn’t right in his mind too because he was constantly speaking about stomach pain and against capitalism.
My point is that Zangara was previously suffering from some kind of weak delusional disorder, which during those days was known as paranoid disorder, and after his gallbladder surgery, the situation got worst. Meaning he obviously developed serious mental illness in which a person cannot tell what is right from wrong. The main feature of this disorder is the presence of delusions, unshakable beliefs in something untrue or not based on reality. Individuals such as Zangara with delusional disorder, often continue to function normally, apart from the subject of their delusion, and generally do not behave in an obviously odd or bizarre manner, which again explains his almost normal behavior. So some patients, such as Zangara himself, might become too much preoccupied with their delusions that their lives become disrupted. Obvious proof for that is Zangara’s preoccupation with his desire to kill a President or some big time capitalist, or maybe “someone” who was both capitalist and allegedly hated all Italians.
Later records showed that in his own mind Zangara was obviously always a nobody, with an illusion that he had no kind of hope of ever becoming somebody, and so people like that usually become simply mad and often try to impose their pain to others so everybody can understand their situation or at least, everybody can hear about it, and so their usual targets are usually famous people. In other words, sometimes they become an easy “tool” for someone else’s desires in accomplishing that same atrocity. For example, If Zangara talked to some people, like his uncle or his alleged “longtime friend” Davis, regarding his crazy ideas and violent solutions, then there was a great possibility for that kind of information to arrive at the wrong door or entered the wrong ear, since judging to his open talk after the assassination attempt, he obviously had no problem in sharing his ideas.
So it is quite possible that Zangara probably shared some of his violent ideas and desires towards the world’s most powerful capitalists at the time with few of the people which he obviously met during his stay in the U.S. My point is that powerful organized crime syndicates at the time such as the Capone Mob or the Chicago Outfit, obviously had the power of manipulation and in fact, manipulative people usually prey upon your good and caring nature and the reality is that Joe Zangara was that same kind of victim, meaning he somehow cared for the world, or found a “getaway door”, and felt betrayed by the so-called capitalism, since that same time period the Great Depression already spread out through the country.
Some of the smarter Mob members within the hierarchy of Chicago’s underworld, were preying on sensibilities and emotional sensitivity, and they knew that they had a good chance of hooking some weak individual into some kind of imaginary relationship, since that same victim is often feeling and caring person. But obviously the reality is that they only care about what the victim can do for them. You see, by that time some of the mobsters and racketeers have mastered the art of deception and they often appeared respectable and sincere, which was a way of luring their victims in some sort of a relationship. Manipulative people are really not interested in their “target”, except using him or her as a vehicle to allow them to gain control so that they can become an unwilling participants in their plans.
Zangara allegedly landed in Florida around five months before the political gathering and so when he allegedly read the newspapers that Mr. Roosevelt was coming down to Miami, that’s when he decided to go for the kill and to satisfy his crazy desire. This report came later which was made by government investigators who came to a conclusion that Zangara was in fact some kind of anarchistic individual who came to kill the President of the U.S. Reports say that Zangara bought a .32 caliber five-shot revolver from a guy named Gordon Davis, who in turn was a Miami pawn broker. Davis sold the gun to Zangara with an ammo pack of ten bullets. The problem was that Davis had a criminal record back in Chicago and the main thing is that during those days Miami was a Mob heaven for retired racketeers and refugees and also an open territory for all gangsters around the country, including the Chicago Outfit.
This is the point for which I previously talked about, meaning the Mob allegedly used assassins with almost no criminal connection, while at the same time being connected to some individual with minimal or former mob connections such as Jack Ruby from the infamous JFK/Harvey Oswald assassination, or in this case, Gordon Davis. So my next conclusion would be that Zangara bought his weapon from one allegedly “former” Chicago criminal who previously fled Chicago and later resided in Miami, which means there’s obviously too much coincidence in the whole story, meaning a Chicago criminal selling a gun to the future assassin, while at the same time the Mayor was having problems with the whole Chicago Mob. Again, it was similar situation decades later with the JFK hit, when the infamous Jack Ruby previously worked with the mob in Chicago and later landed in a city where the assassination of JFK occurred, and eliminated the alleged assassin. This is obviously something important to think about, meaning in both cases there was some small and almost “non-existent” Mob connection, a tactic which was used by many crime syndicates.
