Word: valachi
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...feud simmered until 1957, when Genovese decided that Costello had to be executed. According to Valachi, he dispatched Vincente ("The Chin") Gigante, an enormous ex-prizefighter, to do the job. At 11 o'clock on the night of May 2, 1957, Costello arrived by cab at his apartment building on Central Park West. As he strode through the lobby, Gigante said, "This is for you, Frank," and fired one shot as Costello wheeled around. But his aim was way off, and although Costello was covered with blood when he reached Roosevelt Hospital, the bullet had only creased his skull...
Died. Joseph Valachi, 66, professional criminal turned informer; of a heart attack; at a federal prison near El Paso, Texas, where he was serving a life sentence for murder. During public hearings before a Senate subcommittee in 1963, Valachi revealed details of the operations and membership of the crime syndicate popularly called the Mafia. He argued that the organization was actually called "La Cosa Nostra" (Our Thing), a fact that some insiders doubted, but Valachi's testimony gave currency to the term and stimulated the Government's campaign against organized crime...
...Mafia, but over the past five years more and more independents and amateurs have crowded into the act: Cubans, Puerto Ricans, blacks, even a few hippies. Top Mafia bosses supposedly banned all dope peddling in 1957 to clean up their image and avoid prosecutions, but, as Informer Joe Valachi said in 1963, "there is always somebody sneaking...
...revelation occurred in 1957, when New York state police happened upon a meeting of the Commission and its lieutenants at the estate of Joseph Barbara in upstate Apalachin. The authorities were able to find out who the mobsters were and, more important, that they were together. In 1962, Joe Valachi, the Cosa Nostra soldier-turned-informer, confirmed and explained what the FBI had been hearing from its bugs for months. Though he looked at the Mob from the bottom up, Valachi's remarkable memory nonetheless provided invaluable insights into its organization. From January 1961 to December 1968, the Government indicted...
...custom that had to be dropped was the kiss of greeting between members. "Charlie Lucky [also known as Salvatore Luciana or Lucky Luciano] put a stop to this and changed it to a handshake," Joe Valachi told Author Peter Maas. " 'After all,' Charlie said, 'we would stick out kissing each other in restaurants and places like that...