Word: dio
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...gangsters, or Communists, then the lifeblood of New York City, and really of the U.S., can be cut off ... We are going to get into mass extortions, misuse of power, and mistreatment of individual union members." Then, with a parade of witnesses, Counsel Kennedy showed how Racketeer Johnny Dio and his friend, Jimmy Hoffa, took over in New York with just such purposes in mind...
...precocious teen-age pupil of Murder Inc.'s Louis ("Lepke") Buchalter, urbane, well-tailored Iceberg Johnny Dio, 43 (real name: Dioguardi), was belatedly packed off for a three-year stretch at Sing Sing by Racket Buster Tom Dewey in 1937. The charge: extorting protection money from garment district truckers and cloak-and-suiters. Long out of stir and prospering by 1950, Dio became a smoother thug, refined his old muscle technique to set up "paper locals" (no rights, few members), shook down businessmen with threats of "labor violence" and picketing. So powerful grew "Mr. Dee" that two months...
...Dio's triumph was short-lived. Last week a jury found Tough Boy Dio guilty on state charges of bribery and conspiracy in soliciting $30,000 from two complaisant Brooklyn electroplating firms in return for "labor peace." After one all-night session, the jurors sent word they could not reach an agreement, but General Sessions Judge John A. Mullen sent them to a hotel for rest and sober second thoughts. The guilty verdict opens Dio to a maximum sentence of two years in prison and a fine...
...Dio's troubles are not over: this week in Washington, members of the Senate committee investigating labor racketeering, already proved specialists in underwater demolition, will call on Iceberg Johnny Dio to explain just exactly how he used his paper locals to help Midwest Teamster Jimmy Hoffa win control of New York City's 125,000 drivers...
...private talk recently, Italy's President Giovanni Gronchi once again urged his old friend, Left-Wing Socialist Leader Pietro Nenni, to break with the Communists. Sadly Nenni replied: "That's exactly what I'm trying to do. But it isn't easy, Dio mio, it isn't easy." Last week, for the first time in ten years, Nenni broke with the public Communist line on a fundamental policy issue. European unity. But Dio mio, it wasn't easy...