Organized Crime History

Pittsburgh’s mafia may not have been as infamous as New York’s Five Families or Chicago’s Outfit, but for nearly a century, the LaRocca Mafia Crime Family ruled Pittsburgh’s underworld with an iron fist. This is the untold story of power, betrayal, and survival, from the blood-soaked streets of Wylie Avenue to the backroom deals that shaped the Steel City’s economy. This book uncovers the full story of Pittsburgh’s organized crime history, from the first dons to the final days of the once-mighty LaRocca family.

In 1945, US intelligence officers in Manila discovered that the Japanese had hidden large quantities of gold bullion and other looted treasure in the Philippines. President Truman decided to recover the gold but to keep its riches secret. These, combined with Japanese treasure recovered during the US occupation, and with recovered Nazi loot, would create a worldwide American political action fund to fight communism.

In "The Five Families of New York," Mafia Library presents a gripping account of the ascension and decline of New York's foremost crime syndicates, from the legendary Lucky Luciano to the notorious Paul Castellano and John Gotti, and beyond. Through vivid storytelling, the book chronicles the relentless assault waged against these five families over two decades, a campaign that stands as the most successful law enforcement effort of the last century.

The Genovese family created a name for themselves from their decades-long reign over the streets of New York, dominating from the 1930s through the 21st century.

Dive into the clandestine world of one of the most notorious crime syndicates in American history with this comprehensive book on the Colombo Mafia Crime Family. This meticulously researched work unveils the dark and complex web of activities, power struggles, and influential figures that shaped the Colombo family's legacy. From the early rise of Joe Profaci, the mastermind behind the family's establishment, to the turbulent times of Carmine Persico, this book covers a vast timeline, shedding light on the intricate operations of the family.

"We are the people our parents warned us about" is the motto of the Bandidos, one of the world's most feared outlaw motorcycle gangs. For ten years, Steve Utah was a Bandidos insider. He arranged the security of their clubhouses. He 'cooked' ecstasy and ice for them. He was at meetings where interstate and overseas drug and weapons smuggling was planned. He saw stolen military weapons being sold. He witnessed vicious beatings, helped dump corpses.It all became too much and, in an attempt to regain control of his life, Utah resorted to the unthinkable....

Mafia Spies is the definitive account of America’s most remarkable espionage plots ever - with CIA agents, mob hitmen, “kompromat” sex, presidential indiscretion, and James Bond-like killing devices together in a top-secret mystery full of surprise twists and deadly intrigue. In the early 1960s, two top gangsters, Johnny Roselli and Sam Giancana, were hired by the CIA to kill Cuba’s Communist leader, Fidel Castro, only to wind up murdered themselves amidst Congressional hearings and a national debate about the JFK assassination.

They have names like Barmy Bernie, Daft Donald, and Steamin' Sammy. They like lager (in huge quantities), the queen, football clubs (especially Manchester United), and themselves. Their dislike encompasses the rest of the known universe, and England's soccer thugs express it in ways that range from mere vandalism to riots that terrorize entire cities. Now, Bill Buford, editor of the prestigious journal Granta, enters this alternate society and records both its savageries and its sinister allure.

In the early 1900s, prior to World War I, New York City was a vortex of vice and corruption. On the Lower East Side, then the most crowded ghetto on earth, Eastern European Jews formed a dense web of crime syndicates. Gangs of horse poisoners and casino owners, pimps and prostitutes, thieves and thugs, jockeyed for dominance while their family members and neighbors toiled in the unregulated garment industry. But when the notorious murder of a gambler attracted global attention, a coterie of affluent German-Jewish uptowners decided to take matters into their own hands.

Welcome to the shadowy realm of organized crime, where power, money, and violence reign supreme. In Shadow Syndicates: The Dark World of Organized Crime, delve into the histories of the most notorious crime syndicates across the globe, from the Italian Mafia and Russian Mafia to the Yakuza, Mexican Drug Cartels, and many more. This comprehensive book offers an in-depth exploration of how these organizations have shaped the course of history through bloodshed and corruption. Learn about the Italian Mafia's deep-rooted influence in politics and business, the rise of the Russian Mafia in the ...

Havana Nocturne takes listeners back to Cuba in the years when it was a veritable devil's playground for mob leaders Meyer Lansky and Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Thanks to strong ties with the island's brutal dictator, President Batista, the mob soon owned the biggest luxury hotels and casinos and launched an unprecedented tourist boom. But their dreams collided with those of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and others.

It's men like Jimmy Coonan and Mickey Featherstone who gave Hell's Kitchen its name. In the mid-1970s, these two longtime friends take the reins of New York's Irish mob, using brute force to give it hitherto unthinkable power. Jimmy, a charismatic sociopath, is the leader. Mickey, whose memories of Vietnam torture him daily, is his enforcer. Together they make brutality their trademark, butchering bodies or hurling them out the window.

From its inception, Atlantic City has always been a town dedicated to the fast buck, and this wide-reachinghistory offers a riveting account of its past 100 year, from the city's heyday as a Prohibition-era mecca of lawlessness to its rebirth as a legitimate casino resort in the modern era.

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.

America loves him. The FBI hates him. His life depends on one last daring escape. It's 1934, and America is in the middle of a crime wave. John “Jackrabbit” Dillinger has become America's first celebrity criminal. Many Americans view him as a modern-day Robin Hood, exacting revenge on the banks responsible for the misery of the Depression. Having achieved the fortune and fame he's always desired, the Jackrabbit realizes that it has come at an enormous price. Now, all he wants to do is settle down with his girlfriend Billie and live a normal life. That will be tough to do with the FBI ...

In the ashes of postwar Japan lay a gold mine for certain opportunistic, expatriate Americans. Addicted to the volatile energy of Tokyo's freewheeling underworld, they formed ever-shifting but ever-profitable alliances with warring Japanese and Korean gangsters. At the center of this world was Nick Zappetti, an ex-marine from New York City who arrived in Tokyo in 1945 and whose restaurant soon became the rage throughout the city and the chief watering hole for celebrities, diplomats, sports figures, and mobsters.

In 1942, a rational fear was mounting that New York Harbor was vulnerable to sabotage. If the waterfront was infested with German and Italian agents then the US Navy needed a recourse just as insidious to secure it. Naval intelligence officer Commander Charles Radcliffe Haffenden had the solution: recruit as his own spies, members of La Cosa Nostra. Pier to pier, no one terrified the longshoremen, stevedores, shopkeepers, and boat captains along the harbor better than the Mafia gangs of New York, who controlled the docks in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Burn Boston Burn is an astounding true crime narration. A conspiracy of nine men, including three Boston cops and a Boston firefighter, burned Boston and surrounding communities in the early 1980s due to tax-cutting measures that caused layoffs of hundreds of police and firefighters. Over two years, these fire buffs-turned-arsonists torched 264 buildings, causing millions of dollars in damages and hundreds of injuries. The city was ablaze with nightly fires, sirens wailing through the streets, and people too afraid to sleep.

For over a century, the Bruno-Scarfo crime family reigned over Philadelphia before a series of internal and external events led to their downfall. Such was the power that the family possessed that they had close connections with the Five Families of the New York Mafia.

Returning to his days as a reporter for El Espectador, Gabriel García Márquez chronicles, with consummate skill, the period in late 1990 when Colombian security forces mounted a nationwide manhunt for Pablo Escobar, the ruthless and elusive head of the Medellin cartel. Ten men and women were abducted by Escobar’s henchmen and used as bargaining chips against extradition to the United States. From the testimonies and diaries of the survivors, García Márquez reconstructs their bizarre ordeal with cinematic intensity, breathtaking language, and rigor.